‘A Three Year Rent Freeze And Temporary Tax Relief For Renters’

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This morning/afternoon.

Irish Aviation Authority Conference Centre, Dublin

Scenes from the Sinn Féin – A New Economy for A Changing Ireland conference including Pearse Doherty TD (above), Sinn Fein finance spokesman and Dr Rory Hearne (pic 2), of Maynooth University.

As he closed the  conference, Mr Doherty said:

Today I am announcing a bold and urgent policy in keeping with our priorities in the coming budget to tackle this growing cost of living crisis. Sinn Féin is proposing the introduction of a temporary tax relief for renters.

This relief will cover the price of one month’s rent for every renter in the State for a period of three years.

In other words, the relief will be 8.3% of rent paid in a year. It will be capped at €1,500 per renter, and will be refundable to ensure working families on low incomes can benefit.

Alongside this measure, Sinn Féin is proposing a three year, emergency rent freeze.

“Existing tenancies would have their rents frozen at their current levels. All new tenancies would be pegged to the Residential Tenancies Board standardised average rent index by County and where appropriate Local Electoral Area….”

Fight!

Sinn Féin proposes three year rent freeze and tax relief for renters – Donegal TD (Donegal Now)

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53 thoughts on “‘A Three Year Rent Freeze And Temporary Tax Relief For Renters’

  1. Cian

    Did SF say how much will this cost?
    Did they say what will be cut to pay for this?

    back-of-envelope calculation: 350,000 renters @ €1000/month = €350 million.

    1. Ron

      Considering the amount of money the current Government waste every year I’d say it’s absolutely achievable

        1. Giggidygoo

          Billions available in apple tax which your FG fiscal gurus don’t want to collect and on which they spend millions fighting the EU.
          You’re some clever boys alright.

          1. Cian

            If Apple lose. That 17bn will be snapped up by the other EU countries. Ireland might get to keep 350million.
            In year 2. What will you cut to get the 350million?

          2. Giggidygoo

            @Cian. the usual eh? ‘If’s’, and then the once choice line. And of course, don’t forget the ‘might’.
            Your FG buddies created this housing and rental situation. Purposely creating a situation to benefit the landlord class and the vultures. Maybe purposely reversing the situation might help?
            Boys in mens positions. That’s a big problem. In the pockets of vulture funds and others – well that’s an even bigger problem.

          3. Cian

            Okay (if this make you feel better).

            *When* Apple lose. The other EU countries *will* be in to take their fair share of the tax. Ireland hasn’t bought enough iPhones for Apple to make 17billion. This is profits from across the EU. So we *will* get 3% of the 17billion – max.

            Is that better?

          4. Cian

            FG […] created this housing and rental situation
            Um. No they didn’t. This crisis has its roots 30 years ago when the governments decided to sell social housing to the renters (at 40-60% discount) AND the failure to replace that stock with new houses. The 2007 crash didn’t help – there were too many houses. And then the credit dried up. Builders couldn’t get money to build – they still have difficulty getting cash. The planning process doesn’t help. The 6-story limits don’t help. The NIMBYs stopping planning doesn’t help.
            And yes, FG have made a mess of things. They tried some stuff – the rent zones – but that didn’t help. But it is not fair to put the whole blame on them.

        2. SOQ

          Half of all rent is tax so half of all increases over the past 5-10 years are tax. Given that fact, should you not be asking where that all additional revenue has gone to?

          1. Cian

            It’s not half. But I take your point that is could be a hefty percentage.
            Some of that extra revenue has gone in to balancing the books. Our tax revenue dropped from 48bn to 32bn between 2007 and 2010. Expenditure also dropped, but by a lot less. We had to borrow on the national debt to pay day-to-day bills (social welfare, health, etc).

          2. johnny

            Cian here’s more than your 350 million number which is totally made up……..

            “The ongoing and cumulative costs of the reduced rate are substantial, estimated at €490m in 2017, and €2.6bn in total since its introduction. The scale of these costs against the limited benefits point to significant deadweight. Furthermore, with an economy at close to full capacity, further stimulus in the sector can lead to a misallocation of resources (capital and labour) – further adding to overheating pressures and aggregate productivity challenges.”

            https://www.finance.gov.ie/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/20180727-9-Percent-Report-Final-For-Print.pdf

        3. Johnny

          How much did/does that VAT reduction on newspapers given by Finn Gael to benefit primarily DOB/INM cost ?
          What’s the estimated losses off capital gains tax on the breaks given to yank vultures by Finn Gael ?
          How much is that “apple tax” that Finn Gael is appealing ?
          How much has NAMA cost in overhead and loses by fire selling in bulk state assets,under the direction of Finn Gael?
          There’s more lots more….

    2. realPolithicks

      You’re very good at shooting down every suggestion made to help deal with the housing crisis, whats your solution to this problem. Please don’t give the obvious one of more supply which will take years come close to providing any kind of solution especially at the pace things are moving currently.

      1. Cian

        Here is one possibility. We need to raise money and build houses.
        1. Property tax. This is based on old (low) prices. Allow the property tax re-evaluation go ahead as planned. All the extra money is ring-fenced for social housing in the area.
        and either
        2.a. Social welfare. Reduce all social welfare by €5 (excluding pension). This money is ring-fenced to pay for new builds of social housing.
        2.b. Water Charges. Reintroduce water charges. The money that currently comes from central funds can go into building.
        3. Implement legislation to tax horded lands in the rent pressure zones.

        All of these will fund the building of new social (and affordable) housing. As the homes are built, and people come out of hotels and B&Bs and then HAP will save additional monies that can be used to either fund more houses or to rollback on #2 above.

    3. Giggidygoo

      The usual FG Back Of Envelope calculation I take it. You learnt from Abacus Noonan then? Wasn’t it SF that pointed out Noonans Fiscal Space incorrect calculatios to him.
      Another one that is overdosed on shill pills.

  2. Col

    If you’re not addressing supply, you’re not doing anything as far as I can tell.
    This is not addressing supply.

      1. Hansel

        Agreed, we need to stop the land hoarding: it’s going on all over the country. Big tax on land hoarders please – they’re getting monetary gain from making an asset useless.

        People here on Broadsheet are very quick to blame “landlords” but even if every landlord dropped their prices overnight, there’s still a shortage because some large offshore investment funds are hoarding land and not building on it: if it’s zoned for housing then use it or lose it!

  3. nellyb

    Rent freeze will not work, people will start offering topups off the book to get ahead of “competitors” to secure place to live; it’s an old story. State needs to borrow and build, build, build.

    1. Clampers Outside!

      You should put that into twitter…. you’d be set upon by rabid dogs with PhD’s in all sorts of whacky subjects… particularly your gender studies types tend to lose it somewhat, from what I’ve seen :)

          1. millie st murderlark

            I stopped using fb about seven years ago and I don’t miss it. My dabble with Twitter lasted about a week.

            So much happier without them.

          1. Brother Barnabas

            NNNNNHHHHHH NNNNNNNNHHHHH*

            a physician by definition will diagnose a medical etc condition and decide on treatment, but will not conduct surgery – so a physician wouldn’t perform an emergency tracheotomy

            *denotes wrong answer

  4. Jake38

    Rent freeze. Well there’s a gimmick that will do wonders for supply.

    I’m looking forward to the day when the Shinners get to implement an economic policy and the public get to see the actual results.

    Obviously I will be observing from afar.

  5. diddy

    Why don’t they go back in time to 1955 in a Delorean and Consult the government of the day on how they managed to build donnycarny drimnagh etc with an impoverished exchequer?

  6. Zaccone

    Instead of using that €350mn a year for a tax credit that will just results in rents rising to match, the state could build approx 2,000 new apartments a year every year, at very high/conservative price estimates, in Dublin. That would put far more of a dent in the market medium/long-term.

    If even SF are afraid to invest in more government built housing then the country really is in trouble. Not a single major political party willing to do anything that might even slightly rock the property-owner’s boat.

  7. McVitty

    Pray Irish universities don’t add a new rushed-together “housing economics” module for economics under-grads – they’ll have enough curve-balls in life.

    Some housing affordability causes homelessness but for the guys living in tents, my guts says their situations are either a lot more complex (mental health, addiction) or a lot more simple (vagabonds). Those people have nobody to turn to, no friend or family offering to give them floor-space, for some reason they do not engage homeless services. In short, they do not exist in out society and it should prompt people to ask further questions or at least some sort of survey to find out where they come from, if they aren’t from Dublin etc.

    Some of the things said in this piece are alarming: https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/politics/noneu-nationals-set-to-be-cut-from-homeless-figures-36878103.html
    People evading being processed by immigration services, yikes.

    To address it, it has to be understood….if some of the conclusions are unpleasant.

  8. johnny

    Can here’s more than your 350 million number which is totally made up……..

    “The ongoing and cumulative costs of the reduced rate are substantial, estimated at €490m in 2017, and €2.6bn in total since its introduction. The scale of these costs against the limited benefits point to significant deadweight. Furthermore, with an economy at close to full capacity, further stimulus in the sector can lead to a misallocation of resources (capital and labour) – further adding to overheating pressures and aggregate productivity challenges.”

    https://www.finance.gov.ie/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/20180727-9-Percent-Report-Final-For-Print.pdf

    1. Cian

      Thanks for this johnny. This is, at least, a decent proposal.

      For those of you that didn’t open that link – it relates to the ‘special’ 9% VAT rate for hotels.

      As for the €350 million, I multiplied the number of households renting (private) [CSO data from 2016] by the average monthly rent [most recent]. The numbers renting has probably increased since then, and the average rent actually paid is less then that. But it’s a reasonable ballpark (€320-€370m). But if you don’t agree with that figure tell me how you would calculate it.

      1. johnny

        Cian it doesn’t just affect hotels, its regressive and one the main beneficiaries from this FG reduced rate against the Dept of Finace recommendations,due to concentration,is Dennis O’Brien.

        “Expenditure on 9% rated goods and services largely represents discretionary expenditure by households. This form of expenditure is particularly sensitive to income growth and to the economic cycle – more so than prices changes. Household disposable income has been growing consistently in recent years, and is expected to increase further over the medium- term. Therefore, demand for 9% rate activity looks particularly strong at present. However, this report also finds that the 9% rate is regressive, benefitting better-off households disproportionally more than worse-off households.”

        1. Cian

          Sorry. My bad – I was reading on my phone

          The areas affected are – but I can’t see a breakdown of which of these are largest in terms of (lost) revenue:
          Hotel lettings, including guesthouses, caravan parks, camping sites etc.
          Catering & restaurant supplies, including vending machines and take-away food
          Printed matter e.g. newspapers, brochures, leaflets, programmes, maps, catalogues printed music (excluding books)
          Cinemas
          Theatres, certain musical performances
          Museums, art gallery exhibitions,
          Facilities for taking part in sporting activities, including green fees charged for golf and subscriptions charged by non-member-owned golf clubs
          Fairgrounds or amusement park services
          Hairdressing services
          Horses and greyhounds not supplied for agricultural or food purposes [increase from 4.8%]
          Historic houses and open farms [increase from 0%]

  9. Jose Rico

    In image number two about the actual numbers being higher than official numbers… is he citing the source of that data from himself?

  10. Frilly Keane

    Freezing rent huh?

    That’s one way to motivate landlords to sell up and eff off out’ve the sector

    Is that the strategy?
    Whatty we want
    Landlords out!
    When d’we want it
    NOW!

    Great ye’ve created a buyer’s market
    And homes for everyone
    The owner occupier type everyone
    Mighty stuff lads
    No more pesky landlords
    No more renting
    Only Buyers – with heaps of cash
    And Borrowers – for Banks starving for business

    The bank of mom and dad?
    It’s up t’ ye now

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