Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)

I am glad to get the opportunity to talk about this Bill. It relates to an important topic. People talk a good deal about local property tax, especially those who cannot ill-afford to pay it and who are often in trouble. It gives those people who are living hand to mouth and who barely have enough to cover the cost of everything, from putting food on the table to keeping their heat or whatever going, great trouble. This measure will facilitate the crowd with the expensive houses worth more than €1 million. The value of houses has gone up everywhere. To buy a house is an impossibility with the costs and the rates that apply now. This is a tax on the family home. While we get services out of it, I often wonder whether the money is divided out fairly and whether there is real accountability for it within the local authorities. It gives some local authority members a lot of anguish. I see that chief executive officers of the local authorities will be given the facility to increase it by 25%. I do not see any facility to bring it down if there were a need to do so.

There are certain things that arise in this regard. Many people do not get much for the property tax. We had incidents in Kerry this spring where the streetlights were not working in many towns and villages such as Kilgarvan, Castleisland and Scartaglin. There was so much trouble. It took months to get them repaired. I do not know what was wrong, but people were continuously giving it to us in the neck that they did not even have the streetlights any more for safety when it came to walking to the shops and so forth.

We used to have a facility in Kerry County Council where two roads could be nominated for repair if they were in a bad state. A total of six councillors were in that area at the time. This used to happen in July. Roads which are not on the three-year roads programme fall into disrepair. It happens due to the impact of lorries, bad weather, frost and even heat, which can lift the tar and leave roads in a desperate state. That scheme was abolished in 2012 because the country was in a desperate state financially. It has not been restored since. The scheme gave the councils a bit of power and made them feel wanted and needed. Councils felt they could respond to the requests of the people. That is sadly missing, and I am asking that it be brought back.

As already stated, many people are living in poverty. Many are poor and struggling to put food on the table. It gives them a lot of trouble, and I feel for those people. There should be some way of assessing people’s ability to pay this tax. More often than not, the people I refer to live in local authority houses. Although the councils are the landlords in this situation, if these people request little repairs to their houses, the councils do not seem to have the money to do many of them at all.

We see money being wasted. In Kilgarvan, which is the village I left today at 6 a.m., there are two council houses that are voids. They were lived in until November last. The roofs and chimneys have been taken off them and air-to-water heat systems are being installed. That is a waste of money when these houses had open fires. I spoke to a lady in another village who was upset because the council told her that it is going to revamp her house and that a similar system is going to be installed. She explained that all she wants is her little fire, which is very cosy and gives her satisfaction when she puts it down and keeps it going all night. All she wants is to be left the fire. This is a waste of funds when we could be turning houses around much quicker. Some people just want homes. They do not want to be roasted inside them. While there may be more heat out of a heat pump, the electricity bill might be more across the year because the electricity has to be left on longer.

We are wasting money in certain instances that we could better spend elsewhere. A house in Marian Terrace in Killarney was vacant for five years. It costs way more to put in heat pumps and do all the work relating to them rather than to just do the necessary things to ensure people are comfortable and that their houses are painted and can be lived in. Doing this extreme revamping of heat systems was the Green Party's idea. However, that party is no longer in power. I am asking the Government to take over and ensure that money is not wasted in this regard.

Money is being wasted in Fossa in terms of work to narrow the road there. On the N72, starting out on the Ring of Kerry from Killorglin, two vehicles now cannot meet. The footpath and the cycleway are wider than the road. Work is ongoing there. When you are held up there; you would often look and size it up. You could drive down the inside of the road up on the footpath and on the cycleway with any kind of car or vehicle. It is way safer, and there is more room than there is on the carriageway.

Things like that are happening and are causing problems for many people.

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