Alan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank my colleague and newly appointed and excellent spokesperson Senator Rebecca Moynihan for putting this motion together and I also thank my colleague Deputy Ó Ríordáin for working on it with her.

I wish the Minister, Deputy Darragh O’Brien, and the Minister of State, Deputy Peter Burke, the best. Trust me, I know how difficult their challenge is. Given the previous comments on what Fianna Fáil has done in regard to housing during its terms in office in recent decades, particularly the comments of Deputy Duncan Smith, I am glad the Minister of State, Deputy Peter Burke, as a chartered accountant and forensic analyst, is in government with Fianna Fáil because his experience will be useful. I wish him the best of luck; he will need it.

We all know we are in difficult times and that we have to support one another. The Labour Party is suggesting solutions and raising issues it knows the State has to deal with. I stood in the Dáil and outside it at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic and spoke about the issues related to rent and evictions. I found it quite amazing that the previous Government could not introduce rent freezes because it was regarded as constitutionally impossible. I always knew it was constitutionally possible because I introduced them. Fianna Fáil, the main party in opposition at the time, did not believe they were constitutionally possible. They were possible because, all of a sudden, when the pandemic struck, they were brought in. It has never been fully explained to me how Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael made a volte faceand were, all of a sudden, able to introduce such a measure. It very much shows the real issue, which is that housing and preventing profiting from rent among landlords are not really at the core of what the two parties believe. This is what distinguishes Labour Party Members and many others in the House from members of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael.

We supported the housing measures introduced by the Government when Covid hit. We did so because they were necessary but we will remember it was incapable of introducing them before that. The Government’s attitude towards this motion is disappointing because, quite frankly, its counter-motion is offensive and amateurish. I do not know who wrote it but I believe it is amateurish. The Minister of State proposes to delete a line that recognises the loss of income to households through “no fault of their own”. He proposes to delete the line that recognises cumulative debt from rent or mortgages will crystallise for many households. He even proposes to delete the rather complimentary statement that the ban on rent increases and evictions during the pandemic has led to a decrease in homelessness. I do not know why that perverse deletion would be made. It is not a good start. I wonder whether it is because the Minister of State wants to brush the issues of rent and homelessness under the carpet. It is telling that his alternative text does not even mention homelessness. Deputy Carthy is not present now but the day on which I will take lectures from Sinn Féin on housing will be the day on which the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission does not tell us that one quarter of all UK homelessness deaths were in Northern Ireland, the day on which it does not tell us that 205 homeless people died there in 2018, and the day on which Deputy Carthy or Deputy Ó Broin will make a statement condemning this. We must remember every day the hypocrisy of preaching in the way they do when we know from Sinn Féin’s practice in another jurisdiction what it has achieved.

Regarding to what is really before us, we have to consider what the public is facing. We share the Government’s ambition to create jobs and to come out of Covid but the fact is we do not know when the economy will be got back up and running, nor do we know the scale of the resources required. It could be months or years before the economy is back up and running. I accept that nobody knows but in the interim thousands of households will face crystallised debt they will not be able to pay. One day, the walls will come tumbling down and somebody will have to pay the debt. Those I have mentioned will not be able to pay it so the Government might as well face it now. A plan needs to be in place to help those affected because they will not be able to pay. It is just a fact. The debt will crystallise day by day, week by week, month by month and, potentially, year by year. The Minister of State is in for some wake-up call if he honours what he said in his alternative motion, that is, that hundreds of thousands of people have had their incomes largely protected. Hundreds of thousands of people are in serious bother, and many renters are among them. The basic fact underlying our motion is that, despite the exceptional pandemic unemployment payment and all the other supports, many workers are actually worse off. Therefore, we need to support them.

The Government has taken no action in relation to the banks to give homeowners several months without mortgage repayments. It has now been exposed that they have been left open to additional interest charges. I raised this with the Taoiseach earlier based on confirmation from the Central Bank and the European Banking Authority. This is affecting so many. It is not believable that the Taoiseach, having sat through my comments, is now instructing his Minister to go off and speak to the banks. A range of European jurisdictions, which I could mention, have spoken to the banks and ensured interest charges of the kind in question will not be imposed. Many of those who face extra payments in the order of thousands of euro will note that what has occurred could have been prevented if the Minister or previous Minister, or both, had spoken to the banks. It is unbelievable that this did not happen.

To hear a Banking Federation representative say the additional interest will be socialised across other mortgage holders who can pay is just rubbish. It is not a case of talking to the banks on these issues but of telling them that what is happening is not acceptable, that the clock should be rewound and that the interest should be got rid of. It is a question of our saying we know it should not be charged. We should point to what other jurisdictions have done, use the analysis across Europe, say out straight what the citizens of this country have done for the banks, and say we are not allowing people to be absolutely screwed and ripped off during the Covid pandemic owing to their being charged more in unnecessary interest.

We need a plan for mortgage repayment periods that are longer than first envisaged. The problem will feature for much longer and, potentially, there is a need for other vehicles to help those in various circumstances. We need a plan to ensure people will not be ripped off because of interest rates and how banks are dealt with. I have always been nervous about the Minister for Finance, Deputy Paschal Donohoe, dealing with the banks. I have been nervous because, while the representative of Banking & Payments Federation Ireland approached the Minister for Finance when the Covid pandemic kicked off, it should have been the other way around.

They should have been summoned then instead of offering to meet the Minister. The Minister needs to instruct them rather than it being the other way around. I am deeply suspicious and we need a plan in this regard.

We also need a plan for rent debt. Many people sitting at home, some of whom are watching us now, are facing huge and crystallised debt of thousands of euro. They are people in this city and in other cities. They are people in Mullingar and in other towns and villages. We need a plan and the spirit of this motion is to deal with that scenario and the other scenarios that my colleagues and I have referenced. It is deeply worrying and not a very good start for the Government that the Minister has decided to oppose this motion.

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