Brian Stanley (Laois, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

We have been seeking rent controls for the past number of years and the Government has kept batting the issue back saying we do not need them or not just yet. This Government and the previous one have failed spectacularly to introduce effective rent controls. Rent controls, together with ensuring people have a roof over their heads and, more important, ensuring that those roofs are kept over their heads would save the Government money because we would have fewer homeless people and less rent allowance to pay out to private landlords. It would ease the pressure on the working poor, which the Minister's party claims to be protecting. The working poor in some cases are paying as much as 60% of their meagre wages in rent alone. That is criminal.

The previous Government introduced a measure where rents could only be increased every two years and we were told at the time that this would solve the problem. I remember saying that it would not address the problem. Sinn Féin colleagues and other Members on this side of House highlighted that. Many landlords got the benefit and brought in massive rent hikes, which in some cases were as much as 30%. I have seen rents in County Laois increase from €550 per month to €800 per month. In Monasterevin in County Kildare I saw rents increase from €700 per month to €1,000 per month. A daft.ie survey shows that average increase in rents in the past 12 months in County Laois was 13.6% and in County Kildare it was 13.4%.

Meanwhile, 300,000 houses are vacant across the State. According to the housing agency, 12.1% of houses are vacant in County Laois and 7.8% are vacant in County Kildare. Banks and vulture funds have been repossessing homes and they are stepping it up with gusto, but they are boarding them up and sitting tight waiting for the value of the houses to increase. Families are being forced into an already overpriced, overcrowded and congested private rented sector, or worse still, into homelessness. This is a huge problem. The Land League fought for fair rent and fixity of tenure but now, after a century has passed and we are into a new century, we are trying to get those principles applied not to land but to houses and to the rental sector. It is most important that people have a roof over their heads because the lack of it affects everything else, health, education and employment. All of those are tied into it whether people have the key of a door and secure housing.

Government inaction is adding to the problem. For six years those in government have turned their faces away from this. I ask the Minister to do the right thing and to put effective rent controls in place, link rent increases to the rate of general inflation and bring in measures where tenancies can be transferred with the sale of a house. All of us know of cases where when houses were sold and the bank or the vulture funds moved in they wanted to move out the tenant. The tenancy should move with the sale of the House if the tenant has a contract. More of the people who have unsustainable mortgages should be moved into the mortgage to rent scheme and an ambitious housing building programme should be accelerated. We want to see that driven on. We want to see more local authority housing because that has to be part of the solution.

Governments are supposed to govern and regulate and, thus far, this Government, following on from the previous one, has failed to address this issue. What vested interests are holding this up? We appeal to the Minister to support this Bill. It is simple and straightforward. It is good for people who are in private rented accommodation, it is good for the taxpayer and it is good for the public finances.

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