Seán Canney (Galway East, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to speak on the Bill. At the outset, I declare my own interest in that I am a landlord.

We talk about evictions and we demonise landlords because we are trying to portray landlords as the cause of all our housing problems. The opposite is borne out by the fact that landlords are actually selling any properties they have because they cannot continue to work in a system where they are being accused of everything and not being supported in anything. I have seen cases where tenants have been in houses where they have not paid their rent. I have seen places where houses have been wrecked. I received an email this morning about a local authority house in a private estate where windows were broken probably for the tenth time and they still remain in the estate.

Many things are going on which are not being spoken about because it may not be politically correct to talk about them. If we are challenging landlords on anything, it should be how we keep them in the system and keep them letting houses. They want to get out because the system is totally against anybody who has a house for rent. Yesterday evening I received an email from a man who has two houses and he wants to sell them straight away because the stress is too much. That is not talked about often enough and it needs to be said.

However, the real problem is with the supply of houses. I mentioned it yesterday evening in the previous debate. We are now building houses and we are building momentum in social housing across the country. However, we are missing having a correct housing management system. These houses cost hundreds of thousands of euro to build, are state-of-the art, have the most modern heating and electrical facilities within them and have the highest building energy rating, BER. Unless local authorities are funded to manage these estates, they will fall into disrepair in a very short time.

In my county we built houses in the 1980s and 1990s, which is not long ago, and we demolished them three years ago to build new houses. We let them go to rack and ruin. We need to ensure whatever we do is right for the long term. If I build my house, I build it for the long term not for the short term. As I want to hand it on to my family, I keep the house in the best condition I can. I pay for it myself. Likewise, the local authorities need to maintain their housing stock and make sure that management systems are in place and that antisocial behaviour or anything like that is dealt with and nipped in the bud straightaway. Approved housing bodies also need to ensure that they are managing their housing stock. It is not just a question of creating ever-increasing numbers; we need to do more than that.

We have a major issue with voids and how long it takes to get a local authority house back into the system again if the tenants leave it. It can take six, eight or 12 months. Some houses could be up to two years vacant before coming back into use. This kind approach is not helping in any way. There is a lot to be done to address the housing situation.

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