Martin Conway (Fine Gael)

I thank the Minister of State for his response. I understand this issue is not within his remit. I would have liked the Minister to come to the House in order to indicate a clear timeframe for this. We need a common sense approach to these matters. In fairness to the Minister of State, Deputy Perry, he shows that all the time in the work he does. In this case, the common sense approach is that when people are experiencing difficulties in making their rent payments, those payments should be deducted at source. I would go so far as to say that people in receipt of social welfare who are in local authority housing should have their rent deducted from their welfare payment. Such an approach has the benefit of an administrative saving by removing the need for the collection of rent. It makes sense to do so in this time of information technology and advanced communications. Nor is it a case of the State taking something from people to which it is not entitled. As we seek to ensure a general provision of high-quality local authority accommodation, we should also be moving towards a paperless system where rents are collected by electronic means.

My greatest concern is that by the time the programme for Government comes to its conclusion in four and a half years, we will still be in the same situation. Will the Minister of State send a note to the Minister for Social Protection alerting her to the need for a timeframe for action in this area?