Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Unfortunately, many of us warned of the challenges of enforcement when the former Minister, Eoghan Murphy, was introducing the 2019 regulations. There is a solution to this as regards the platforms, that being, to amend the Planning and Development Act to allow planning authorities to apply administrative spot fines to platforms like Airbnb for every day they advertise properties that are not in compliance with planning law. I strongly urge the Minister's Department - in parallel with the Minister, Deputy Burke's work on the short-term letting and tourism Bill - to look at parallel changes to the Planning and Development Act to do exactly that. This would remove the onerous requirement for local authority planning sections to have to go to the courts to prove something very difficult.

It is a simple requirement. A short-term letting platform like Airbnb or an estate agent should be required under the planning Acts to secure clarity on planning compliance from the host. If that is not available to the planning authority on request, every single day that property is advertised, an administrative fine that does not require court sanction is applied. That would clean up the Act. 2026 is too far away and if the planning changes were done earlier, they could have huge effect, particularly in areas with a significant rental and homelessness crisis, such as Dublin city, Cork and others.

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