Fianna Fáil councillor, Jason Murphy, has suggested there should be a six month amnesty for social housing tenants who are not officially on the rent book.
Speaking at the December Plenary meeting, Cllr. Murphy, said “We all know of them, they are people that are living in council houses that are not assessed for rent, they might be related to the person that is assessed, they could be a partner, they could be whatever.”
“This could go on for years, and it goes on so long that the people can’t come forward because they are going to be backdated a massive amount of rent. It comes to a head then when someone passes away or something like that happens and they will come to a local councillor, and they’ll want to apply for a succession of that house and they were never on the rent book in the first place.
Cllr. Murphy went on to say he did understand how people found themselves in these situations, but that the Council should find a way to bring them back to legitimacy, as this would generate more rent and stop succession problems in the future.
“I can understand why people do this. Needs must and you don’t want to see someone homeless. But at the same time, they are not regulated so the Council is missing out on rent.”
“Could we take a pragmatic view of this? Could we possibly put an amnesty in place, give people an opportunity to come forward, to regulate their situation? There’s people that can’t come forward because they could be backdated 10, 15 years in rent, and they are not in the position to pay that.
Cllr Murphy went on to suggest the Council should give an amnesty of 6 months for unregulated tenants to come forward.
“I think if we gave them an amnesty maybe for six months to come forward regulate it, put them on the rent book, do not backdate it. I think it would be a win-win situation, the Council would be getting rent for those people who are unregulated, and those people then would be in a stress free situation where they could actually be tenants in a social house.
I think all in all we should take a compassionate and pragmatic look at this, I think we could be very imaginative in Waterford if we put this forward, gave people an opportunity to regularise their situation and the Council then could levy a rent.
Director of Services for housing Seamus de Faoite, responded positively to the suggestion, but did have some reservations as to its fairness.
“It’s a very good point,” de Faoite said. “It’s an issue that we are looking at.
“It’s a fundamental question: do you backdate these people? Then it goes back to equity—why should that person not pay a rent?
“It is an issue that we will look at and are looking at.”
AARON KENT
Funded by the Local Democracy Reporting Scheme
