Dessie Ellis (Dublin North West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Over the past three years, there has been much austerity coming from the Government. This has made life harder for struggling people on low and middle incomes. Some of the lowest paid and most vulnerable in society are tenants of local authorities. This is because of the very narrow parameters one has to fit between in order to be able to apply for social housing and the even more narrow parameters required for a person to actually be housed. People who fit into the first set of parameters almost always end up in private accommodation, receiving rent supplement that costs the State nearly €350 million annually. Recent rent increases in the private sector have pushed rent supplement to the limit and have done massive harm to many families. Far too many people have been made homeless due to these rent increases, so much so that there are record numbers in need of emergency accommodation. This kind of accommodation is bursting at the seams due to the failure of the Government to protect tenants from rent increases by implementing rent controls.

In the case of local authority homes, rent is controlled and it is much less likely that a tenant will lose his home. This is welcome, but the Government needs to strike a balance by having rent that is both fair and affordable. This balance has been struck in many ways, but we are dealing with people who live on extremely tight budgets and who have been the victims of many cuts over the past three years. The cut to the dole for young people was particularly hard. Increases in utility costs and the cuts to the household benefit, in addition to all the supplementary payments that must be made, took their toll on people living in council housing. The impending water charges loom large in the minds of these people. They will not pay, simply because they cannot pay.

Next summer a new rent scheme will come into place that will set base levels and thresholds for rent, in addition to bands. These may not change much, but there are some projections indicating that rents could increase for some people who really cannot afford to pay anything more. It may be an indictment of our economy and many other factors, but it is a reality that must be considered when setting the basic criteria for how local authority rent is charged.

I wish to ask the Minister about voluntary housing bodies and their rent levels. We recently saw the obscene set of circumstances in which a property that the State helped to develop was left idle because a Catholic housing association in Dublin was refusing to accept rents in line with the reality of what people could pay. Instead, it wanted market prices. Of course, most approved housing bodies charge a fair level of rent, give good service and are always eager to have their homes occupied, but a lesson must be learned from that. Common sense eventually did prevail.

Councils and approved bodies must continue to allow people to rent at a fair and affordable price. Will the Minister commit to not changing the rent scheme in any way that would result in higher rents? Senior citizens and such people who pay a certain rent could be affected if the proposals are implemented. I have examined some of the rent levels and am extremely worried that the new rent scheme will be much more disadvantageous. I ask the Minister to consider it very carefully. I realise we will be debating it thoroughly in 2015, but I just believe we need to examine it carefully now. I am worried about the bands that are being proposed.

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