Residential Tenancies (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2026: Committee Stage (Resumed)
Seanad Éireann — 2026-02-19
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Chris Andrews (SF), Labour Panel

I was not critical of the units. I was critical of the cost of the units on the glass bottle site. Rents there are between €2,500 and €3,500 per month. Senator McCarthy mentioned Spencer Dock where someone he knows was paying over €3,500 for a one-bedroom apartment. How is that affordable for any working family or anybody in the inner city who worked on the front line during the pandemic, ensuring society continued? None of the families living in Pearse House, Countess Markievicz House, Whelan House or O'Rahilly House in Ringsend can afford those rents. They cannot afford to pay the rents that are being expected and charged on the glass bottle site. They are being excluded from their own community, and that is fundamentally wrong. It shows there is a two-tier society being created and Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are creating and pushing ahead with increasing the gap between the haves and the have-nots.
This is Senator Aubrey McCarthy's amendment, not a Sinn Féin or Labour Party amendment. The Senator is an Independent and his amendment states:
Within two years of commencement of this Act, the Minister shall publish a report examining the impact of this Act has on the rental market. The report shall be laid before the Houses of the Oireachtas.
That seems reasonable. How can anyone find fault with that? It is not unreasonable to expect a review. The other amendments are the same. How could anybody find fault with a review? The Government wants to just plough ahead making mistake after mistake without reviewing anything. That is the modus operandi of the Government - plough along, continue making mistakes and do not take on any good ideas that Independent Senators have.
This amendment is not unreasonable. I am curious as to why the Minister would not accept it because, as Senator McCarthy said, we have to know how policies being put in place now impact residents in the future. I can tell the Minister that residents in my constituency and across the country are very fearful about what is going to happen. To give an example, rents in Galway, which are currently €1,302 a month, will soar to €4,020 per month.
This is based on an average RTB figure as it is weighted, so it is more accurate than a simple average of the other figures in that graph.
A proposal like this is not unreasonable. If you are in the private sector, reviews are always done. We should be supporting this amendment and I do not understand the logic for not accepting it.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-02-19/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:39+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-02-19