I move: That Dáil Éireann: notes with extreme concern that: — 7,062 eviction notices were issued to tenants from January to March this year, up 51 per cent on the same period in 2025; — at the end of 2025 new rents were up statewide 5 per cent and 4.4 per cent for existing rents; and — six counties had double digit rent inflation last year including Limerick (12.6 per cent), Monaghan (12.4 per cent), Westmeath (11.5 per cent), Offaly (10.8 per cent), Cavan (10.6 per cent) and Galway (9.9 per cent); further notes th…

When the Minister made his announcement last summer about the intended changes to the regulation of the rental sector two things happened. The first is that every quarter since July there has been a dramatic increase in eviction notices. In July, August and September it was a 38% increase. In October, November and December it was 41%. In the most recent figures it was 51%. That is the direct consequence of the policy decisions the Minister and his colleagues in the Government have made. During that whole period ren…

I understand the Minister had a very frank and potentially positive meeting with the Oliver Bond regeneration forum, so I am hoping he can update the House on the progress that was made and also listen to some of the concerns some of us continue to have with the approach being taken by the Department, not just with respect to the Oliver Bond complex but also concerning the other inner-city flat complex regeneration projects across Dublin.

I thank the Minister. This may be one of those rare occasions where we might have more in common than we have to disagree about. I do think the letter sent by the Minister’s officials to Dublin City Council in April was a mistake. The Department’s position had shifted significantly from the stage 1 approval in 2023 or 2024. The amalgamation of blocks L, M and N from 74 units to 46 units had already been approved in principle two years ago. In fact, the revised scheme from Dublin City Council includes a significant …

I am hoping to hear that there is some flexibility to return to the good elements of the Dublin City Council scheme so we can get the resolution that the residents of the Oliver Bond complex, in particular, desperately need.

The hardening attitude of the Department to the issue of amalgamations is a problem. The issue here, in the first instance, should be to ensure that these homes are brought up to modern standards and, exactly as the Minister said, for good estate management, that there is an appropriate mix in each block, as well as across the development. I disagree with the Minister slightly in that I think Dublin City Council had actually put forward not just the proposals for the three blocks in question and Bridgefoot Street, …

Again, I am not hearing anything from the Minister that I disagree with. The quicker all of us can move on right across the inner-city flat complexes, the better.

The Minister previously informed us that it was his intention to have the legislation to underpin the Celtic tiger-era defects redress scheme not just introduced but passed by the Houses of the Oireachtas by the summer, with the objective that homeowners and owners' management companies could apply for inclusion in the scheme before the end of the year. Obviously, that legislation has not been published. Can he give an update on when it will be published and when he expects to have it passed by the Oireachtas and o…

I appreciate the answer, although none of that is new information. The specific question I asked was when this legislation will be published. When does the Minister expect it to complete its passage through the Oireachtas? When does he hope owners’ management companies will be able to apply? With respect to the interim scheme, I appreciate that finally four pathfinder projects have been approved, but that relates to over 200 schemes that desperately need this funding and it has been two years or more since the sche…

I thank the Minister for that clarity. One assumes that while the Minister may publish before the summer recess, it is likely the Bill will only come before the Oireachtas in the autumn. It is fair to say, to give some clarity to owners' management companies, that that means it is highly unlikely a scheme will open for applications this year, and it will more likely be next year. With respect to the memo the Minister spoke about regarding retrospective pathfinders, there was some media commentary that there might h…

I have raised this with the Minister before. It is really to try to understand where this particular policy originated. As he knows, OMV is calculated prior to any discounts being applied for the purposes of affordable purchase schemes. That open market valuation does not necessarily have to be based on the all-in cost of development and in some developments is coming in significantly above that. It is not in the legislation or in any of the statutory instruments. When I discussed the matter with local authorities …

I thank the Minister for that explanation. The difficulty is that part of the problem is that not only is he not meeting his formal purchase targets, but in many instances the full cost of those properties is exceptionally high. In fact, in some developments it is as much as €500,000 and others, including the ones he referenced in my constituency, it is €440,000 to own the property outright. The difficulty is that by using open market value rather than all-in cost of development, we are increasing the cost to the p…

This is probably the only product in the world where the price you pay for it is not the price that it cost to deliver it, plus profits, but a fictional valuation of an open market value. As for the only additional question I will ask, the Minister may not be able to answer it because it predates him taking up his current role. At any stage was the consideration of using open market value a concern about the potential impact of an affordable housing scheme on surrounding private market houses? Unlike cost rental wh…

First, I fully agree with my committee colleague. In the Minister's consideration of this, it should not just be a question of the limit. When the Minister spoke about this at committee before, he was also looking at possibly linking the eligibility thresholds to some metric, and I have given that some thought since the committee meeting. Given that social housing is typically for a set percentage of households depending on their income, EU-SILC data, which is updated every year, could provide a useful link. In add…

And the workers rejected it.

It is not working.

Not agreed.

For decades, the residents of Oliver Bond House have lived in some of the most appalling conditions in our city. Decades of neglect have left these families living in damp, overcrowded, rat-infested homes. In April, the Department of housing wrote to Dublin City Council refusing a funding request to deep retrofit and amalgamate 74 homes in the flat complex. The rationale was that the council's proposal would see a reduction in the number of flats. The Department set out an alternative approach and requested that th…

For decades, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have neglected Dublin city's and county's flat communities. I am talking about inner-city flat complexes like Pearse House, Oliver Bond House, St. Michan's House and Dolphin House but also suburban schemes like Cromcastle Court in Coolock and Balgaddy in my constituency. These are strong, vibrant and resilient communities that have been utterly failed by successive Governments. So bad were the failures that in 2014, residents from 20 council housing estates supported by the Co…

The Government refused Dublin City Council the funding for Oliver Bond House yesterday.