LABOUR’s housing spokesperson and Limerick TD Conor Sheehan believes that the rental market demands serious attention as some landlords seek to cash in on renters’ misery.
Speaking in the Dáil, Deputy Sheehan hit out that rents have consistently risen under the Fianna Fáil-led Housing ministry.
He also considers what he deemed “the blatant breaching of rules like the rent pressure zones (RPZs)” as truly shocking.
“The Residential Tenancies Report should be marked urgent on top of the Minister’s desk in Custom House. Renters are continuing to pay the price for incompetence and indifference by Fianna Fáil when it comes to their plight,” Deputy Sheehan insisted.
“There has been plenty of bluster on RPZs, with the Taoiseach speaking out of both sides of his mouth on the issue. Irrespective of whether they are staying or going, the harsh reality is there is zero enforcement of the RPZ rules as rents have risen above and beyond the limits.”
Labour, he continued, has long called for a rent register to set reference rents so that prospective tenants can have some degree of information to hold landlords to account.
“Rather than squirming to protect landlords over renters, the Minister should take a look at the facts. The RTB data does not show an increase in landlords selling to exit the market. Instead, there has been a 4.5 per cent annual increase in private landlords in Ireland,” he told the Dail chamber.
“I urge Fianna Fáil to wake up and start operating in fact, not fiction. We now know that they wilfully misled the public on the true level of house building last year. They cannot continue to use debunked arguments against protecting renters.
“To end higher rents and speculative development, we need to see serious and ambitious state intervention when it comes to supply. The Minister needs to act.”
