Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am glad to get the opportunity to talk about housing again this evening. We should be striving to give confidence to home owners. At the present time, they are frightened about the eviction ban and by all of the talk about eviction. I honestly feel that this is doing more harm and is ensuring that people will not rent out their houses. That is where we have gone wrong. There are so many vacant houses in good places but people just will not rent them out. There are two reasons for this. The first is that the tax they have to pay, at 52%, is too much. In Kilgarvan and places in that vicinity, one will only get €600 or €700 per month and if one has to pay half of that in tax, what has one got left? However, the biggest problem is that people are worried that they will not be able to get tenants out if they want their place back. They are afraid that they will not be able to get their place back and that is wrong. Even without the eviction ban, if a tenant goes through the legal process and does not want to leave the house, it takes four years before the householder can get the house back. That is if the tenant is paying. If the tenant is not paying the rent, it still takes 12 months. That is all wrong and it has to be looked at.

The Residential Tenancies Board, RTB, is too strict with the regulations and is not being fair. It is not even not helping the tenants either, when it comes down to it. The RTB is on the house owners' backs. People are afraid and are frightened away from renting. They would do anything now. They will sell their houses or will leave them idle. We cannot force them to rent out their houses because they are totally frightened away from it. All of this talk about extending the eviction ban, day in and day out, is totally wrong. If people build a house or buy a house and pay for it, it is their house and if they want it back, they should be able to get it back in a reasonable time and reasonable fashion.

Most tenants and landlords get on fine. I do not like the word landlord but most of them get on fine. There are problems with a few and that is what has caused all of this hullabaloo. It is frightening so many house owners and stopping them from getting into the market.

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