Maurice Quinlivan (Limerick City, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for his contribution, although I found some of it quite bizarre. It seems to be Government policy now to claim that every time we on this side of the House speak, it is about social media clips. I do not do social media clips, in fairness, but I do stand up for my constituents. As he said, we all have people and families coming to our constituency clinics who are in absolute distress. The homeless action team in Limerick is under massive pressure, with 80 notices to quit issued last week.

The Government is losing control of the situation and we are in a crisis. A look at daft.ieshows there are ten properties available to rent in Limerick city. The monthly rental cost for a basic three-bedroom apartment in Dooradoyle, an area popular with families, is €1,600. Year on year, according to daft.ie, rental prices have increased by an average of 15.5% in Limerick city, with a three-bedroom house now costing nearly 13% more than it did this time last year.

We in Sinn Féin have long argued that renters deserve a break. They deserve some security and to be paying less than some of the extortionate prices currently being charged. We have proposed a number of actions that could and should be taken to alleviate the stress on renters. The Minister of State has dismissed some of them but I will restate the ones I have raised in this debate and in other debates over the past two years. Our proposals include a three-year ban on rent increases and a rent rebate that would put one month's rent back into the pockets of hard-pressed renters and ensure greater security of tenancy for renters. We have proposed to resource the Residential Tenancies Board, RTB, to enforce the Government's rent regulations properly and introduce real tenancies of indefinite duration. There is a rental crisis and a lack of accommodation throughout the State. As of 1 May, the number of properties available for rent across the country stood at 851, which was a 77% year-on-year decrease. We have a problem.

In the short time remaining to me, I will speak briefly about the plight of residents in the Shannon Arms apartment complex in Limerick city, who are facing a most unscrupulous attempt to evict them in order that landlords' profits can be increased. These residents, many of them young families, are facing eviction. They have been treated in the most undignified way, with intimidatory tactics used and threatening letters issued. This is happening after some of the families have been at the location for more than a decade. Some of the tenants have already been bullied out, with their apartments apparently relet as short-stem stays to maximise profit. Given the lack of rental properties available in the city, many of the residents will be facing homelessness if an intervention is not made. Landlords in the complex, some of them well-known multimillionaires who often appear in the media, have placed the whiff of extra profit before their moral responsibility to their long-term tenants. As we are debating short-term lettings and a diminishing rental stock, I appeal to the Minister to intervene in this matter and ensure this community of families is protected from Dickensian-type landlord behaviour.

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