Barry Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Notwithstanding my disagreement with the various mechanisms the Minister of State has outlined that may be used and tested in order to substantiate a certain rent increase in a proposed lease, I note that both inside and outside the House the Minister of State and the Minister have been quick to say discrepancies or differences of opinion, particularly on the part of the tenant, related to proposed increases and the mechanisms by which those increases are put forward and not agreed can be referred to the PRTB for adjudication. However, I am sure the Minister of State is aware that many staff have been taken from the PRTB in the past 18 months - I believe it has halved in recent years. I would be concerned that it does not have adequate funding or personnel to deal appropriately with the increased requests that may emanate from this legislation. What provisions, if any, have been made to deal with any such additional requests by the general public especially by tenants?

Will the Minister of State confirm that the staff has been reduced by up to 50% since the Government came into office? Will he confirm that the funding and resources available to it has been reduced greatly? Will he confirm that there is a waiting list for its services? If so, how long is it? By association, how long are people waiting for adjudication on existing disagreements on leases between landlords and tenants? Will this new legislation impose a further workload? If there is to be a further workload, how does the Minister of State envisage the PRTB being able to deal with it? If he cannot clarify that this evening, it renders meaningless many of the mechanisms between landlords and tenants to agree increases where agreement does not take place because there is no way there can be adequate recourse to fair and independent assessment of them.

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