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

We have a different view about how to deal with rents than some of the other Opposition parties. We believe we should control rents, as is done in other countries, and set rents at affordable levels based on people's income and the size of the property, not refunds or things that will inflate the market, but actual rent controls.

I go back to the example of Mairéad. Based on average Dublin rents, Mairéad is paying between €18,000 and €24,000 a year in rent after tax on her income of €30,000. It is similar for Roan and Nicole.

How are they possibly supposed to manage that? How do the abysmal and derisory measures just referred to by the Taoiseach in any way deal with that? They simply do not, and for the Taoiseach to mention HAP is just unbelievable. The vast majority of people with HAP in Dublin are making top-up payments to landlords because the HAP limits are too low, so the landlords are creaming it with public money they are getting as part of these rents of between €1,800 and €2,200 per month. In addition, they are getting tax breaks on the rental revenue and capital gains they make on the property. That is while Mairéad, Roan, Nicole and their child, along with tens of thousands of other renters, are being absolutely screwed to the wall. There is not one word in the budget books about renters. There is not a single word.

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