Cian O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

Based on a sample from what he knows. He has seen a sample where there were four attempts to use it, and from that four rulings were made by the RTB in favour of the renters. That would concur with the point I was making, which is that this clause is not being used by landlords and that they are not having findings on their side but that it is allowing for a tactical use of serving eviction notices, causing all the upheaval that goes with that and all the appeals and the process that are involved. Over that time, a landlord is able to get from 20, 30 or 40 households down to five, six, seven or eight but below the threshold of ten. Therefore the remaining tenants are no longer protected by the Tyrrelstown amendment.

If that clause or loophole were not in place, there would be no ability for a landlord to do that and they would just have to get on with it and sell the apartment block. They would decide to do the same as what happens in other European countries and sell with the renters in place. The problem would be solved in that way. If that happened, the norm for large-scale holdings, apartment blocks and so forth being sold would be that they would not be sold with vacant possession but with the renters in their homes. If that was the norm then the normal market return would be to sell with the tenants in situ. There would not be a group of landlords at a disadvantage compared with another group of investors that might be achieving a different rate.

The market return would settle in at that level and it would be baked into the situation. It would be baked into people's considerations when they are making investments and purchases and so forth. Investment would still continue and the market would know what to expect. It would get rid of this uncertainty we have where if an investor wants to get vacant possession it has to go through serving these eviction notices, eventually withdrawing them and whittling it down to below ten tenants before doing eviction notices. It would help avoid having this prolonged period, which creates inefficiencies for the landlord, creates terrible turmoil for the renters and creates inefficiencies in our housing stock of this ongoing vacancy in perfectly good housing for prolonged periods.

Our situation is almost a lose-lose one if we zoom out of it. What I am proposing, just for this small bit of rental stock, would bring us towards the European norm. Investors would know what the situation is, they would not be trying to achieve vacant possession and they would bake that into their calculations. It would be good for renters, the investors would still be in business and the system would work. I heard and respect the comments from the Minister of State, although I profoundly disagree with them. I will push ahead on this Bill and work to try to get it through. This would be a small measure that would make the world of difference to some people and we would still have a healthy and vibrant rental market.

As I have said, the countries in Europe with the largest and healthiest rental markets and with the most investment in rental markets would never be discussing a Bill like this because this is just the normal practice and standard for all rental properties in the likes of Switzerland, Germany and so forth. These are large rental markets with plenty of investment, plenty of return for investors and a bit of humanity for the renters. I am convinced we will get there as a country but if we got there in the next two or three years, it would save a lot of hassle, it would save a lot of people from going into homelessness and it would even provide cost savings for the State. It would be much better to get there relatively quickly than for us to get there in the next ten or 20 years.

See this speech in context