Ban on evictions will be in place from start of November, Taoiseach tells Dáil

A ban on housing evictions will be in place from November 1st until the end of March, Taoiseach Micheál Martin has told the Dáil.

He also said that since July when Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien gave approval, local authorities have purchased close to 650 properties where tenants in situ were on the cusp of being evicted because a property was being put up for sale.

During Leaders’ Question, Mr Martin Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald that Mr O’Brien is targeting November 1st as the starting date for a ban but he rejected her call for the legislation to be passed this week.

Mr Martin said it is expected to be brought before the Dáil and Seanad next week and “could be in place from the first of next month”.

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[ Eviction ban to last to April 1st, with ‘staggered’ resumption planned ]

People Before Profit TD Richard Boyd Barrett repeatedly pressed the Taoiseach to clarify if people who have current notices to quit will actually be saved from eviction, because the legislation would be “almost useless” otherwise.

The Taoiseach told him that the legislation will be published with all the details. “The day after the Bill is enacted anyone facing eviction is protected.”

He added that the Bill would “stagger the end of the protections afforded in it to ensure there is no cliff-edge impact on April 1st next year”.

And he stressed that the legislation “applies to licences and tenancies in student-specific accommodation and to student tenancies in the general rental market”.

He said that regardless of whether a notice to quit is “in process” nobody can be evicted the day the legislation is enacted “unless he or she has not paid rent and has not fulfilled obligations in respect of good behaviour and stuff like that, for example, not wrecking the place.”

Ms McDonald welcomed the Government decision at Cabinet on Tuesday to introduce a measure to prevent evictions this winter and said her party and others had been calling for this for months. She referred to the case of Graham King and his family, highlighted on RTÉ, who have been living in a tent and car for 53 days.

“Incredibly the family are told that they earn too much to qualify for state housing support.”

She believed that when a family in Ireland of 2022 has to live in a tent “the system is broken beyond recognition”. A ban on evictions was a first step but an accelerated delivery of affordable homes was required along with tackling crisis rents, increasing income thresholds for social housing and an urgent plan to ensure the eviction ban is “gotten right”.

Mr Martin said it was unacceptable that a family would have to live in a tent. He said some 25,000 social homes would be built this year, “but we need to get to 35,000 houses” a year. He said they had the highest number of first time buyers since 2007 and purchases since 2008.

The purchase by local authorities of almost 650 homes where tenants were on the point of eviction because of a property sale was also an important measure, he added.

Labour leader Ivana Bacik welcomed the Government’s “U-turn” on an eviction ban.

But she said “we have to remember that for nearly 11,000 individuals who are homeless, currently, that ban will come too late for 3,220 children without a secure home.

“And we know that these figures will only continue to grow after the eviction ban has concluded unless we address the core problem of a lack of social and affordable homes because all of us know of so many families who are terrified of being evicted or in fear of being evicted or have just been evicted.”

The Taoiseach said the legislation -the Residential Tenancies (Deferment of Termination Dates of Certain Tenancies) Bill 2022 would “give greater security of tenure to tenants during the coming winter period”, and notices of termination will be deferred “from the day after the date of the passing of this legislation and ending on 31 March 2023″.

Independent TD Thomas Pringle said that people in Donegal had been campaigning about mica structural defects since 2014. Criticising the concrete products levy, now down to 5 per cent and delayed until September next year from 10 per cent from April, he said the Government should “go after the banks” and developers.

He noted the Taoiseach’s comments that the mica problem could cost €2.5 billion but he said “there’s not been a penny spent” on dealing with the problem, and claimed that the Government was “going after the people” with the levy.

But the Taoiseach said they were not going after anyone. He said full details of the levy would be included in the Finance Bill to be published on Thursday.