Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

Civil Engagement has tried to track some of the issues which have been neglected in housing. We used our first Private Members’ business to successfully pass a motion on disability and housing. Will the Minister of State update us on what is happening around the issues of disability and housing access, and proper planning in our housing infrastructure for disability? There was a specific commitment in the motion that there would be regular reviews of the Government’s progress around the delivery of adequate and sustainable housing for persons with disabilities. I noted that, in the first half of this debate, the Minister of State indicated he would be interested in having a specific discussion on that matter. Will he confirm if it is his intention to bring in a specialised discussion on housing and disability? We have persons with disabilities who have been in a housing crisis, unable to find suitable housing for a long time, even before the recession and deeply intensified since then.

Civil Engagement has also raised other issues such as Traveller accommodation and lone parents who are increasingly at risk of homelessness. The latter group find it difficult to find private rental accommodation.In many cases, they are concerned that if they join the housing assistance payment, HAP, scheme, they may find themselves being taken off or moved to the bottom of the housing list. They are thinking of what will happen in the long term in bringing up their child.

We spoke previously about the housing issue. I will recap what I said about a vacant site tax, rather than starting from scratch. In this House we proposed the introduction of the measure and asked that the rate of the vacant house tax be increased from 3% to 6%. However, we were told by the then Minister that this would be inappropriate and would present a danger to property rights, yet only a few months ago the Government raised the rate of the vacant site tax to 7%. I was glad to see it being raised, but can we get to a position where constructive proposals from all sides, be they from those who have proposed innovative social measures or those who are bringing rental cost proposals to the table, will not automatically be rejected but listened to and taken on board? That needs to happen. I regret, however, that the Government has not taken on board or co-opted our proposals for the removal of some of the exemptions. There are far too many exemptions that allow somebody, for example, to paint a property black or in other ways to obscure it such that it will no longer fall into the vacant or derelict house category. People can get around the pressure exerted by using such exemptions and loopholes. Tackling the hoarding of land must be a priority.

A key focus of our group is the issue of rent protection, in respect of which we proposed a number of amendments to housing legislation. There has rightly been outrage across the Houses at the recent decision to sell a number of mortgages to vulture funds. Given that we recently had the debate on whether AIB shares should be sold, it is particularly ironic and harder to listen to concern being expressed from the Government side when the power the Government had in the case of AIB was not exercised effectively. However, I want to focus on an issue that is not touched on enough. As well as the terrible damage vulture funds may cause in increasing homelessness by causing families to lose their homes, there is also the question of the kind of landlord vulture funds wlll become after they come into possession of the houses in question. The capital gains tax waiver was introduced to effectively invite vulture funds to buy up large portfolios of properties from the National Asset Management Agency. They are the landlords who are waiting until they have the capital gains tax waiver in place to sell on the properties. They will seek to sell them with vacant possession and will ratchet up rents to seek to do this. There are concerns about the kinds of landlord we are encouraging into Ireland and their practices. That issue needs to be tackled.

I had hoped to speak about the HAP scheme and social housing. I want to highlight one issue-----