Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The daft.iereport on housing rents makes for very dismal and depressing reading. It is another year of double-digit rental increases. Over the past number of years, the increase in Dublin has been quite shocking and is having a huge impact on people. In Dublin, rents have gone up 81% since 2010. Outside of Dublin, that figure is 52% but that includes Meath, where they have gone up 81% and Louth, where they have gone up by about 78% in that seven or eight years. Cork, Galway and Limerick are up 65%. Alarmingly, only about 3,150 properties are available to rent now, which is 20% down on the number available this time last year.

Behind all these figures there are human stories. Many families are under threat of eviction and are extremely worried, having been given deadlines by landlords to leave their properties because they need to renovate them or give them to family members. Many families are now doubling and tripling up, as we know from our clinics. There are people coming in who are living with their parents or siblings and so on. There are young people getting their first jobs in cities and 40% to 50% of their income is going on rent. The student experience is becoming hazardous. It is almost impossible for students going to cities to attend universities and institutes of technologies to get any place to rent at a reasonable cost. By any yardstick, for many families across the country, it is now the dominant measure of the cost of third level education.

Above all, it has an impact on homelessness. There are 9,000 people in emergency accommodation, including 3,000 children. Without doubt, the worsening situation in regard to rents is accelerating and making the homeless situation even more perilous.

All the initiatives undertaken under the various plans have failed. The rent pressure zones introduced in 2016 are ineffective in stemming the rent increases. Housing supply measures are very poor. Housing targets set by Government have not been met.

A report on the tax and fiscal treatment of rental accommodation, published by the Department of Finance in September 2017, made ten recommendations, short, medium and long-term. It is extraordinary that not one of those recommendations has been implemented by Government. There were approximately 212,000 landlords in 2012, whereas now there are only 175,000. There is a problem there. The Government received clear recommendations, yet it chose not to implement even one of them. Why not?

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