Rental inquiry to examine rights of tenants

The Government is to establish a commission on the private rented residential sector, to examine ways in which the position of tenants can be improved.

The commission, which will draw together a wide range of interests and report back by June 1st next year, will be asked to make recommendations towards increasing security of tenure, balancing the rights and obligations of landlords and tenants, and boosting the supply of rented accommodation.

The Minister of State for Housing and Urban Renewal, Mr Bobby Molloy, announcing the decision yesterday, said he had concluded that action on a "broad front" was required, rather than a commission on the issue of security of tenure alone, as he had first planned.

He was now of the opinion that the security issue "cannot appropriately be considered in isolation from other key issues such as rents, supply and quality of accommodation, investment return and market considerations, and existing constraints to development".

However, the Labour Party said that everybody knew by now what the problems of the sector were, and the Government had simply "long-fingered its legislative responsibilities" until next year.

The party's housing spokesman, Mr Eamon Gilmore, added: "The private rented sector is the one area of our housing crisis which is crying out for urgent legislative reform, particularly in the areas of rent control, security of tenure and a licensing system to ensure basic standards."

Mr Molloy said he would be seeking nominations to the commission from bodies in the legal, accounting and auctioneering professions, as well as landlord and tenant interests and the relevant Government departments.

He added that the St Vincent de Paul National Conference on Housing, which was addressed yesterday by the other Minister for State at the Department of the Environment, Mr Dan Wallace, would help inform the commission in its work.

But Mr Gilmore said the fact that the commission would examine only the private rental aspect of the housing crisis showed the "fragmented" and "haphazard" nature of the Government's approach. Labour's own housing commission had looked at the entire problem and reported in three months. This was "the model people sought," he said.

Fine Gael welcomed the Minister's announcement but said the commission should have been established 18 months ago.