Throughout this country, and indeed in the constituency I share with the Tánaiste, people are seriously struggling with rent. Rents are rising rapidly, sometimes swallowing up to a third or a half of people's income, making getting a mortgage impossible for many. Rent pressure zones cap the increase in rent at 4% per annum, and were applied to city council areas and some electoral areas and counties, including the Ballincollig-Carrigaline municipal district in our own county. Some of these electoral areas have since been revised. How will the rent pressure zones apply in new areas which are to be brought into districts that are already rent pressure zones? My colleague, Councillor Michael Frick Murphy, has asked me to raise the issue of whether the southern end of Carrigaline, including Fountainstown, Myrtleville and Crosshaven, will now fall under the new Carrigaline municipal district and a rent pressure zone, and whether they will benefit from capped rent. I am sure similar situations pertain in districts throughout the country as well. Will these new areas benefit from the rent pressure zone?

I understand that they will. The change to the boundary and the changed local electoral area boundaries that go with that will mean that the new city boundary will encompass a rent pressure zone for the whole city. I understand that what was the Ballingcollig electoral area, which is now becoming the Carrigaline harbour area, will also become a rent pressure zone in its entirety.

It is the RTB that will have to confirm the relevant metrics, but that is my understanding.