Landlords to be ‘monitored’ to ensure no evictions during retrofits, says Ryan

Green Party leader Eamon Ryan has said that landlords will be monitored to ensure that tenants are not evicted on the pretext of retrofitting being carried out.

Mr Ryan said the situation will be “constantly monitored” to ensure that landlords were not using the scheme to “in effect” evict tenants.

"This has to be regulated [the retrofitting scheme] so that landlords don't use it this way," he told RTÉ radio's Today with Claire Byrne show.

Mr Ryan also said that the SEAI website had been overwhelmed overnight since the retrofit grant scheme had been announced. The public were interested. “People want to do the right thing,” he said.?

How can our schools tackle gender-based violence?

---

Grave being exhumed at Glasnevin for 1980s cold-case inquiry

---

Listen: Who is being hit hardest and what are the consequences of spiraling inflation?

---

Miriam Lord: Feathers fly as Mattie McGrath rips into Coalition’s cushion

---

Mr Ryan said that the vast majority of retrofitting could be carried out externally so people would not have to leave their homes. However, in situations where it was necessary and people were in social housing, then local authorities would assist.

Mr Ryan said there would be economic and health benefits from the retrofitting scheme. “That is transformative,” he said.

It would take up to three decades to retrofit the one and a half million homes in the country that needed to be retrofitted, the target was half a million homes per decade. He said the country’s housing stock had changed in the 1970s when homes began to introduce central heating, and would be a similar “switch”.

Mr Ryan acknowledged that it could take 10 to 20 years for the cost of retrofitting to be paid back, but there would be “huge benefits” with the increased value of a home.

He expected to see an “exponential increase” in the level of interest in retrofitting. “This is tackling the problem at source.”

While “no one is being forced to do it”, the scheme made economic sense, he said. “This is the best way to address the issue.”

Mr Ryan also defended the Carbon Tax saying that the funding from it would go towards schemes such as retrofitting.