Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)

I extend a céad míle fáilte to Aran and Sophie Byrne who are recently married. They are here with their family - love's young dream in the Dáil. I also welcome the Moylagh Historical Society from the royal county. Fáilte romhaibh ar fad.

The Taoiseach repeatedly tells us that fixing housing is his number one priority so people have waited for the big initiative for some idea that he might bring forward to turn the tide of this emergency. God knows, we have enduring the Government's directionless approach since it has come to office, misleading on housing delivery, beds in sheds and the mad cap housing tsar idea really leaving people wondering would it ever bring forward a substantive proposal. Now, finally we have it. The Government has certainly outdone itself this time because its first major action in housing is to enable big landlords to hike up extortionate rents even further. At a time when Government should be acting to cut rents and to ban rent increases and when people across the State fork out, on average, new rent of €2,000 a month - here in Dublin rent can hit €3,000 per month or even higher - instead it creates a new opportunity for tens of thousands of landlords to jack up their rents.

The Government has made much of the intention to extend the 2% cap to existing tenancies throughout the State. It should go ahead and do that. Let us do that this week. It is clear that this measure is, in fact, to hide the Government's blushes as it provides landlords with the chance to hike up rents in the here and now and as it provides yet another sweetheart deal to investment funds to build expensive rental property and charge extortionate rent. That is the real intention of these measures. The Government claims that landlords will only be allowed to reset rent to the market rate if a tenant leaves voluntarily. Well tens of thousands of renters leave tenancies voluntarily every single year. Under the Government's proposals, as one renter walks out the door they will be replaced by another whose rent will have ballooned. Students will be among the first hit by its actions. Finding affordable rental accommodation has been a constant struggle for students and their families. The Government is now ensuring this will be even harder and that students and their families will be ripped off even more every year. Worse still, the Government explicitly allows all existing landlords to reset rent to full market rate every six years. That is essentially the death knell of rent pressure zones.

The plan is not about protecting or giving stability to renters. It is about allowing corporate landlords, vultures and property funds to hike up rents. These are large landlords that have already got sweetheart tax breaks on their rent roll and on their capital gains tax liability. Fianna Fáil on the side of the big boys: who would have thought it? Tá plean ann chun cíosanna ró-arda a ardú níos airde arís. Ní bhaineann sé seo le cíosóirí a chosaint. Baineann sé le brabús na dtiarnaí talún corparáideach a mhéadú chomh maith le brabús na gcreach-chistí agus na cistí maoine.

When one cuts through the verbiage, this is just a plan to hike up rents; some in the here and now, others at a future date. Rents need to be cut, to come down, not to go up. Rent increases should be banned, not facilitated by the Government. The Taoiseach needs to think again because renters have had enough. They cannot pay any more and the Government should not be forcing them into this position.

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