Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

We absolutely need a mole in the Minister's Department. The phrase "undue segregation" appears here again, as if there is a due or acceptable level of segregation. There is not. Why does it appear? I will tell the Minister why it appears. It is because thede factopragmatic solution is actually about new forms of segregation, and new forms of classification of cohorts of people, who will be suitable for different types of housing based on another phrase I really dislike and find insulting, frankly, which is "social background".

Undue segregation of people of different social backgrounds, therefore, is a prejudiced, preconceived and predetermined notion of certain people living in certain types of housing with certain types of tenures. It would appear they will actually be segregated unless we really get rid of segregation. I know there was segregation in the previous incarnation of the Part V, when it was social and affordable housing. There is segregation in many of the Part V developments where the Part V 10% social housing is literally a separate block, away from the privately-owned housing. It is very segregated and it is a form of social and housing apartheid. Indeed, there are different finishings and so on in different houses.

The other aspect of cost rental I worry about is the fact that it is another investment opportunity. Investors who ask for the building they own or have built to be designated as cost rental will essentially get the cost of the house paid for by the tenant over a period of 25 years, and can then opt out of the cost-rental scheme and sell it on. We are, therefore, creating investment opportunities but at the end of the period, the investors can pull out of the arrangement.

I have another question about cost rental. What happens when a person's income exceeds the cost-rental eligibility limits while he or she is living in the house? In England, they brought in this so-called flexible social housing scheme where a person's eligibility for the social housing in which he or she is living is reviewed every five years. This, therefore, creates the conditions where a person can actually be thrown out of social housing if his or her income exceeds a certain level. Is that going to happen with cost-rental housing? I will be glad to get the reassurance. Certainly, that is what we were being told about cost rental in the earlier incarnations of this a few years ago.

In any event, I do not see why we are creating an investment opportunity in cost rental whereby private investors essentially get their investment paid through rents that will be paid by the tenant, and can then pull out of the arrangement after 25 years, with an investment paid for by somebody else, and sell it on into the market or do whatever they want with it.

That is why I believe things will be far simpler, whether we call it cost rental, public or social housing, if it is based on income. We get rid of segregation, and these notions of different backgrounds, if a person pays his or her rent according to his or her ability to pay and anybody at all can apply for social housing. It is not, therefore, this notion that only people on the very lowest incomes are social housing-type people. Anybody should be able to avail of social housing and pay a different rent according to their ability to pay.

Equally, it should be the same with affordable housing. Affordability should be based on a person's income, not by any reference to the market, particularly when the areas where the housing and affordability crisis are worst are precisely the places where the market is out of control and incapable of delivering affordable housing to ordinary working people.

We will not oppose this Bill but we will seek to amend it. We are concerned that many aspects of the Government's housing proposals, particularly the LDA aspect, will potentially make the situation worse and cost the State a lot of money. We are opposing the Bill dealing with the LDA but we will not oppose this Bill. However, we want it to reflect a proper notion of affordability that is based on income, not the market.

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