Kevin Humphreys (Labour) | Oireachtas source

What am I proposing? Under section 2 of the Bill one would have to apply for planning permission to let a self-contained residential unit for periods of six weeks or less. To use a dwelling for short-term letting is to use it for commercial and not residential purposes. We are still operating under the old bed and breakfast legislation that allows people to use their units in this way if they contain four bedrooms or fewer. This is no longer viable in the economy we have. In the Bill I recommend obligations on the platforms such that they would have to record transactions and that planning enforcement officers could write to these platforms to seek information on whether specific residential units have been advertised on them. I know that some of the platforms are currently assisting Revenue but they have refused to assist planning enforcement officers in our local authorities. I see that as problematic. I have spoken to many planning enforcement officers and I have asked them what problems they have in respect of enforcement. At the moment there is some legislation on these apartments but it is not sufficient. Part of the problem is proof. Officers need to prove that units are being used as short-term lets but they have no access to those apartment blocks.

The legislation is pragmatic but it can be tweaked and there can be improvements. Will the Minister of State consider Government progressing this Bill during Government time so that we could get as many as 3,000 units back into the market? If we look at what has happened in Berlin, Barcelona, San Francisco and many other cities where regulation has been brought in, the market has returned to long-term lets very quickly. Berlin brought in approximately 6,000 units. If one looks at the statistics in the city centre area, when the city brought in legislation similar to that which I am proposing, 3,000 units came back into the long-term let market very quickly. If we got half of that across the country imagine the impact it would have for working families and on the possibility of them getting accommodation at a reasonable price. I will finish with that because I promised the Minister of State and his officials I would keep it brief. He really does have a good overview of what is in the Bill. We need to move quickly to legislate in order to try to get those units back into the long-term residential letting market and to alleviate the housing crisis that we all want dealt with as quickly as possible.