Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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Question 285: To ask the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government the details of all differential rent schemes across all the local authorities. [32145/11]

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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Question 286: To ask the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government if he will make the necessary changes to the differential rent scheme in order that a person in receipt of an incapacitated child tax credit does not then pay more rent as a result. [32146/11]

Willie Penrose (Longford-Westmeath, Labour)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 285 and 286 together.

Local authority rents are set in accordance with a rent scheme adopted by each local council. The making and amending of rent schemes is the responsibility of local authorities as an integral part of their housing management functions, subject to broad principles laid down by my Department in Circular letter HRT 3/2002.

It is a matter for local authorities, when assessing individual households, to consider whether rents payable are in accordance with the authority's rent scheme. Therefore, decisions on whether or not to disregard either a proportion of income or particular sources of income for the purposes of calculating rents are matters for each individual local authority to consider in accordance with their own rent scheme.

As there is no requirement under current legislation for my Department to approve rent schemes, it does not maintain an up to date register of housing authorities' rent schemes. Details of rent schemes are normally published on the relevant authorities' websites.

Section 31 of the Housing (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2009, when commenced, will replace existing enactments in relation to differential rent schemes. Regulations and guidelines for housing authorities to give effect to section 31 are currently in preparation in my Department. When these are made, in the coming months, section 31 will be commenced and authorities will have one year in which to put in place a differential rent scheme under the new provisions. While it is not the intention to introduce a national standardised differential rent scheme, the regulations to be made will more clearly set out the matters that may be included in a local rents scheme, including –

- the level, type and sources of household income that may be assessed for rent purposes;

- how dependents will be accounted for in calculating rent;

- the manner in which the size, standard, etc., of any class or classes of dwellings shall be taken into account in determining rent, having regard to the market rent in respect of dwellings of similar size, standard, etc., in the administrative area concerned; and

- procedures for rent reviews.