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

The 4% RPZs were a total failure. I do not doubt that this is an attempt to improve matters and hopefully it will do so somewhat. I want to flag that there should be no rent increases for tenants in the present situation or any time in the foreseeable future, particularly in the areas most affected by completely unaffordable rents. That is where the RPZs are located. Against the background of rents of €2,000, €2,500 and €3,000 per month and even more for pretty basic private rented accommodation, even rent increases that are less than 4% and linked to the HICP are not acceptable.

I will not vote against the Bill because it is a marginal improvement on the current situation but I want to flag that we will still find ourselves in a significant crisis. Let us not forget that the inability of people to find affordable rental accommodation is directly contributing to the homelessness crisis.

It may be of interest to the Minister to note some encounters I had. They are straws in the wind. When I was walking into Leinster House this morning, I was randomly stopped by two people. The first one was somebody who was outraged about the stamp duty issue and the second one was a building worker who said that he was in a place where he was paying about €500 or €600 per month in rent, which was manageable, but that he had to leave that place. He had started looking around for places to rent and he could not find anything for a single individual that was less than €2,000, which is completely unpayable. This Bill will not address that. Does the Minister have a plan to deal with that fact in the short term?

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