Paul Gavan (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

We will call it a base target; I am not going to row over that. There are several problems with the target or base target, however. First, the circular the Minister sent to the councils was too rigid in its application. For example, he insists that a notice to quit must be given in writing before the council can commence the process of purchasing a house. I am aware that councils believe the Government needs to build in more flexibility that would allow them to engage earlier to give them a more likely prospect of completing purchases.

Second, the Government is operating from an assumption that local councils inspect 100% of RAS and HAP properties each year and that there will therefore be no refurbishment costs attached to purchases. That is a major problem for council staff in Limerick. It means that, in reality, there is no fund to refurbish the houses. It causes a major problem for the council in terms of being able to complete purchases. Many of the properties we will talk about in terms of tenants in situare in a poor state of repair. Therefore, the Government needs to review the refurbishment grant allocated to properties for tenants in situas a matter of urgency to allow for the necessary works to take place and prevent more people from becoming homeless.

Third, there has been no allocation of additional staff to process and progress the house purchases. This I find really shocking. This is something the Minister could and should have been planning for but he did not do so. In Limerick, a team of four staff is currently administering 21 separate housing projects. The best it achieved in terms of purchasing in previous years was 32 purchases in 2018. It simply does not have the capacity to get the work done without significant additional resources. There is every prospect that it will lose ground on work it is currently doing regarding the overall pipeline of future housing in Limerick. For the life of me, I just cannot understand why, during the six months of the eviction ban, the Government did not recognise that we need to staff up councils. It certainly has not happened in Limerick.

In the Minister’s contribution, he made a comment on the cost-rental administration scheme. I really hope that does kick off. I would like to see more details on it because, as he rightly pointed out, the people above the threshold of €35,000 or €36,000 that operates in Limerick will be in real trouble. These people are currently paying €1,500 or €2,000 in rent every month and do not have the money to purchase a house in most cases. Cost rental is absolutely essential. I have just given him suggestions about what he needs to do.

There are many people trying to make the situation better at the minute but there are genuine concerns over the base target. If there are to be 174 evictions in Limerick, a base target of 75 is nowhere near adequate. The estimate I hear is 300 evictions in Limerick by the end of June. The base target is not adequate, the resources are not in place, and there are no refurbishment grants to make the purchases a possibility.

I want to address the point that Senator McDowell made because it is worthy of a greater debate. No-fault evictions do not happen in France, Austria or Germany because tenants have proper tenancy rights. When the Minister referred to a review of tenancy rights, I welcomed it. I want to tell him where Sinn Féin stands on this. It believes in full tenancy rights equivalent to those of tenants in Europe. We do not believe that, in Ireland, we are somehow less worthy of having full tenancy rights. We do not believe property rights should trump the rights of tenants. That is an ideological debate. Senator McDowell can take a different view on it, as he is entitled to, but the fact of the matter is that when looking to Europe and best practice, those tenancy rights are essential. That is what we will campaign for. It is a pity that Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have never recognised this over several decades and still cling to the idea that the right to sell a house and kick tenants out is somehow essential to a functioning housing market, considering that it has been proven daily for the past several years that the market is completely dysfunctional and broken. Sinn Féin will deliver the change we need, but I am afraid to say there is no evidence that the Minister will.