Thomas Pringle (Donegal, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The Bill proposes to amend the Planning and Development Act. I do not wish to discuss that, as it has been discussed by others. I wish to discuss the changes to the Residential Tenancies Act, because that is very important. In August, the Oireachtas passed the Residential Tenancies and Valuation Bill 2020. The protections afforded by the Residential Tenancies and Valuation Act, RTVA, will expire on 11 January 2021 and it is proposed to pass the Bill before the House to extend the protections.

The RTVA was intended to provide breathing space for a narrow cohort of people who have sustained rent arrears during the Covid-19 pandemic, but it did not address the issue of rent arrears directly. It offered no real solution for tenants in arrears and the actions required from tenants were cumbersome and bureaucratic. When the Bill was being considered, Threshold noted that it fell short of what was promised. These shortcomings will not be addressed by the amendments to the Act either.

Threshold has put forward a comprehensive plan to address the issue and it is worth outlining some of what it says. Threshold is concerned that the process is designed with an assumption that the rent arrears notice is valid and that the tenant requires budgeting advice. It may be the case that tenants are funnelled into this process and away from advice on the validity of the notice. There is a concern that tenants lack recourse to a body such as Threshold to advise on the validity of a notice.

In the months since the passing of the RTVA, the experience of the Act has not been encouraging. We understand that up to the end of October, the RTB had only received 286 self-declaration forms and only six referrals were made to the Money Advice & Budgeting Service, MABS, on foot of the Act. As with the previous legislation, a tenant who makes a declaration that is false or misleading in any material respect shall be guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction to a class B fine, with a value of between €2,500 and €4,000, or imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months, or both.

The inclusion of a criminal sanction for making a false declaration can only operate to discourage tenants from making a declaration. There is no evidence to suggest that tenants are likely to make false declarations and therefore no need to impose a sanction. Later sections of this Bill allow a landlord to make a declaration that he or she should be allowed to evict despite the protections offered, and no similar criminal offence is created in respect of that declaration. The creation of criminal offences in this Bill applies only to tenants seeking to avail of its protections but not to landlords seeking to escape its operation.

Under the provisions of this Bill, a tenant will be required to make a written declaration to the RTB and his or her landlord that he or she is a "relevant person" to avail of the protections from 11 January 2021 to 12 April 2021. He or she will be required at the same time to serve a notice on the RTB requesting it to assist him or her to obtain advice from MABS. Within five days of making the declaration, the tenant will also be required to serve a notice on his or her landlord requesting a consultation to agree a rent payment arrangement. It is not clear what will occur if a landlord refuses such a request, or if a tenant, as is often the case, does have the contact details of the landlord.

The Bill builds on the cumbersome and bureaucratic process contained in the RTVA and adds new layers of complexity. The low uptake of people availing of the protections of the RTVA may well be attributable to the complexity of the legislation and the difficulty in navigating the declarations, time limits and notices required. The protections of this Bill will not automatically apply to tenants who declared as relevant persons under the RTVA where they have not engaged with the RTB to get MABS advice or entered into a rent repayment arrangement with their landlord. It would appear such tenants will only have five days from the date of commencement on 11 January until 16 January to apply to the RTB to seek assistance and advices from MABS or to enter a repayment plan if they have not already done so. The timeline on this is not clear in the briefing document. It appears that people who do not act within this very short timeframe will lose their protections on 16 January. There does not appear to be any clear rationale for this short timeframe, which takes in the Christmas and new year period.

Threshold suggests that tenants be afforded until 15 February to meet these requirements, which is reasonable. The protections of the new legislation will not apply where a tenant who makes a declaration does not serve a notice on the RTB requesting assistance to obtain MABS advice, or where a tenant is in rent arrears to the value of five or more months' rent on 10 January 2021. There does not appear to be any need to include a provision that the provisions will not apply where a tenant is in rent arrears for five months. Threshold recommends that the five-month timeframe be removed, which is also reasonable.

The protections shall cease to apply where a tenant fails or refuses to provide the RTB or MABS with required information or documentation, as might be requested for the purposes of obtaining the requisite MABS advice. The measure is problematic and we will have to revisit it again.

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