Ruth Coppinger (Dublin West, Anti-Austerity Alliance) | Oireachtas source

Exactly. That is the kind of law we have in this society. The rights to private property are such that nine tenants equal one landlord. There is something seriously wrong with such a society. We should take on board the fact that STAVE supports the Bill.

The Government makes a number of points in the amendment it has tabled. Essentially, it states it has now done enough to stop these things happening. It also makes the disingenuous point that these issues were well discussed before Christmas. It knows that the Opposition agreed to circumvent the debate in order to allow the Government bring in that law quickly. The Minister will remember that we were all here late at night on the last day and that we all co-operated by limiting the debate in order to allow him to introduce safeguards to stop landlords jacking up rents. Therefore, I contend that we did not debate these issues fully.

One of the points made in the amendment is that the Bill is being opposed because the Tyrrelstown amendment is "already delivering positive outcomes for tenants". There are Tyrrelstown tenants in the Visitors Gallery. The Minister named a provision after them, but he did not consult them beforehand, which is a little strange given that he named the provision after them. They do not feel like they are being protected in way, shape or form. They have successfully fought the eviction notices and are continuing to fight in the Residential Tenancies Board. However, all the vulture fund landlord needs to do is to lower the number of families he or she wants to evict in one go to nine. The fact that nine families, including children, will no longer be in a community will have serious effects on it.

There has been a lot of deception surrounding the Tyrrelstown amendment. The provision still allows vulture funds to evict. That is the reality. They can evict nine families, but, in fact, they can evict any number they want. Perhaps the Minister might clarify the position because reporters and journalists do not seem to have taken it on board. He created a get-out clause in the Tyrrelstown amendment that allows a vulture fund to argue that it is justified in not selling a property with the tenant unaffected, that is, with the tenant in situ, if it will lose 20% of the price on the sale of the property. It can evict any number of tenants in these circumstances. All it has to do is cite it as being hard work to expect them to do otherwise and that it will lose 20% of the sale price. That is very easy to do.

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