The latest report on the private sector from the estate agency Savills warns that rents could rise by up to 25% in the next two years. Last week, during the debate on Sinn Féin's Rent Certainty Bill, we pressed the point that the situation in the sector was getting worse and that time was the crucial factor. The Bill would have helped thousands of families in Dublin and throughout the country who are worried out of their minds about how they will meet the extortionate increases in rent. They do not have the money to keep a roof over their heads, which is why the homeless figures are increasing on a monthly basis, yet despite all of this, Fianna Fáil and its partners in government, Fine Gael, saw fit to kick the can down the road once again. On the same night that Fianna Fáil voted against providing rent certainty for tenants Deputy Barry Cowen complained that there was nothing in the budget for those in the private rental sector. Many of the problems identified in the report for those in social housing and tenants in the private rental sector were addressed in Sinn Féin's Bill. There are now 328,700 people reliant on the private rental sector for accommodation. The vacancy rate is only 1.45%. This is a staggering number of people who are the mercy of a system that clearly does not work for anybody. One of the suggestions made in the report is that the number of vacant units would need to increase by 300% in order to see rent stabilisation. That is obviously unobtainable in the short term and means that the only viable option is introducing rent certainty.

There is also the problem of people living in local authority housing that has fallen into disrepair. There are houses that have not been renovated for decades. I have been in many such homes and the wind blew through the gaps in windows. There was poor insulation, if any; electric wiring that could cause a fire at any time and no central heating system.

That is aside from those homes affected by pyrite and the number of people who in the next couple of years will be made homeless because of this. On that basis, I ask that the Minister responsible be brought back into the House specifically to discuss the issue of rent certainty and what can be done about the extortionate rates of rent increases in Dublin and across the country.

Two weeks ago in the Seanad we passed a motion expressing concerns about certain aspects of the comprehensive economic and trade agreement, CETA, between Canada and the European Union, focusing, in particular, on the lack of legal clarity surrounding what "provisional application" might mean. The concerns have been echoed and vindicated across Europe in the week since by lawyers who have made it clear that declarations do not carry legal weight; by the German Constitutional Court which last Thursday demanded new and explicit assurances; by the Council of Europe's Committee on Social Affairs, Health and Sustainable Development; and by a vote in Wallonia in Belgium on Friday. While the Government happily signed off on the deal last week, others have been demanding something better. Germany, for example, today produced a new declaration of its own designed to address constitutional concerns; Belgium spent the weekend in negotiations and, finally, belatedly, at 9 p.m. last night, we began to hear reports of a new text emerging from the European Commission which mentioned the Vienna Convention and included actual legal references. These changes did not come soon enough or go far enough and provisional application has not been signed off on at the meetings of the Council of Ministers today. The talks will now continue. It is thanks to public and parliamentary pressure that we are achieving the changes deserved. We are now told that there will be an EU leaders' summit later this week, on 20 and 21 October. It hopes and plans to send a strong message of reassurance to citizens that their concerns about the side effects of new generation trade deals will be addressed. This will be the first comprehensive debate on trade since the current European Commission was appointed and it must be a robust debate because there is no consensus and not everyone agrees. The President of the Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, said in recent weeks, "The fact is that in the Council of Ministers you have 12 [countries] in favour of ... strengthening trade defence instruments, and you have ... 12 [countries] who do not like the idea." By "trade defence instruments" he means investor courts.

Where does Ireland stand among the countries referred to? The CETA is still a badly designed new generation deal which represents a dangerous overreach from the proper area, an appropriate area of trade and tariffs, to the areas of public policy and public accountability. However, if there is now a chance to potentially remove the worst element, namely, the investor courts, corporate courts which can place such a huge charge on the public finances, will Ireland seize this opportunity? At the summit this week ill it support changes that might remove the investor courts? Will the Leader put it to the Government which so lightly dismissed the Seanad motion last week to reflect on the legitimate concerns of this House and the concerns of the public and reflect them at the summit of leaders?

I note - this is a compliment to the Government - that the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment, Deputy Denis Naughten, today announced plans to ratify our climate change commitments. This is a welcome development. However, will the Government press for good trade deals that will support rather than threaten those climate change commitments; deliver trade, while protecting quality, health and workers' rights, and recognise that public good and public accountability must always remain the bottom line?