I move amendment No. 5:

In page 6, between lines 13 and 14, to insert the following:

“Review of Act

3. The Minister shall, not later than 2 years after the passing of this Act, conduct a review of the operation and effectiveness of amendments effected by this Act and shall, not later than 3 months after the end of that period of 2 years, or on the completion of the review, whichever is the earlier, make a report, in writing, to each House of the Oireachtas of the findings of the review and of the conclusions drawn from those findings.”.

I welcome to the Gallery Mr. Séamus Hennessy from Roscrea College who is a guest of the Leas-Chathaoirleach. As Mr. Hennessy is visiting from a college, he has no homework for the rest of the week. I am sure he is delighted to hear that.

l do not think Mr. Hennessy needs any homework.

I move amendment No. 6:

In page 6, between lines 13 and 14, to insert the following:

“Impact forecast

3. The Minister shall, as soon as may be after the passing of this Act, but not later than 6 months thereafter, prepare and publish, including publication by electronic means, a statement of forecasts for the following period of 10 years following its publication in respect of the impact of the amendments effected by this Act on market rents for a representative sample of tenancies, together with such other information as the Minister may deem appropriate for the purposes of this section.

I welcome Senator Cathal Byrne. It is amazing he is here because he is getting married tomorrow, of all things. Obviously he has all the preparation work done. I wish Cathal and Sarah all the very best and, as our colleague from Tipperary reminded us, Sarah is from Tipperary so he is doing very well. I hope they have a great day tomorrow, and congratulations, Cathal.

Amendments Nos. 7, 18 and 20 are related and may be discussed together, by agreement. Is that agreed? Agreed.

I move amendment No. 7:

“Notices of termination: temporary ban

3.Notwithstanding any other provision of this Act or any other enactment or rule of law, the period of 3 years commencing on the passing of this Act is deemed to be an emergency period within the meaning and for the purposes of section 5 of the Emergency Measures in the Public Interest (Covid-19) Act 2020 and that section, with the exception of subsection (6)(b), applies accordingly.”.

I welcome the Minister back to the House. It looks like I have the final amendment of the day. It is a not a very far-fetched amendment and it is a good one. It would basically insert a three-year eviction ban. Small landlords and reasonable landlords might be willing to do this. It is the big institutional landlords that probably would not be in favour of introducing this ban. The section would, in effect, reintroduce the emergency period Members will remember from Covid-19. The emergency measure was provided for in the Emergency Measures in the Public Interest (Covid-19) Act and during that period there was a statutory pause on all termination notices. We are calling for this pause until there are more houses built. It is very reasonable. We have another amendment later, which unfortunately we are not going to be able to get to, calling for a ban on evictions into homelessness to stop the evicting of children. As this is being guillotined we are not going to get a chance to speak about it. If the Minister accepts this amendment the new section would provide for a similar ban for three years on all termination notices and evictions. That is pretty reasonable. There are 69 amendments and none of them have been accepted. It would be very fitting for the Minister to accept this one.

I welcome the Minister. I put on record my disappointment we are not getting to debate all these amendments because the Government is not allowing that time. We would have been willing to-----

Opposition Members should have made greater use of their time.

We would have been willing to stay here for the evening if necessary to debate these amendments. I am in favour of amendment No. 7. I am not sure if anyone in the House saw a report launched this week called Renting on the Island of Ireland. It is a piece of comparative research commissioned by Threshold and it highlighted the insecurity tenants face in the Republic. Only 10% of them said they were renting by choice and the worry about evictions was clearly noted. There were dramatic differences with younger cohorts, with 61% of under-35s in the Republic concerned about termination of tenancy, compared with 23% in Northern Ireland, which is obviously also a high figure. Two issues that were dominant among tenants' feelings of uncertainty were unaffordable rents and rent increases and the fear of landlord-initiated terminations. I encourage people to read the report.

We opposed this Bill in general but there were very sensible amendments put down to try to ameliorate the legislation, make it better and make it more workable in whatever way we could for tenants and it is regrettable we did not get to have a full debate in the Seanad today.

To say we should have used our time when we had it is pretty egregious in the context of such important legislation, which is being guillotined. There is no doubt about that. We heard from the other side of the Chamber that we were filibustering but we are just trying to have a meaningful debate about legislation we fundamentally think will not reduce rents. The Government side believes it is-----

Four and a half hours on four amendments is what you have wasted your time on.

Senator Stephenson without interruption.

Four and a half hours on four amendments

I appreciate Senator Casey believes this is going to provoke change but we do not. I thought having meaningful debate was the whole role of the Seanad. Sorry if I am misunderstanding the idea of scrutiny and the extra perspectives we are supposed to bring.

Correct.

Thank you, Senator. We are reaching eviction rates not seen in Ireland since the 1850s. How evocative and how horrifying. This is from an article by RTÉ, so if our national broadcaster is presenting misleading information we can take that up with it. It is from something we would call a trusted news source. This Bill is going to see more evictions. The Minister will talk about the six-year tenancy but I have mentioned before I have sat in this Chamber for hours of debate to discuss this legislation because I care about the impact it is going to have on people. We have major concerns that we are going to see a tsunami of evictions coming from this. We have major concerns about it and reading this article about a level of evictions that has not been seen since the Famine is horrifying and should send shivers down our spines. The article is, as I said, from RTÉ. I am just reading an article from our national broadcaster.

This amendment proposing an eviction ban relying on Covid-19 legislation is just not credible. That legislation was to deal with a very serious public health emergency created by a contagious disease and where people were restricted in their movement. Whatever about arguing for an eviction ban, using Covid-19 legislation is an egregious approach.

As for eviction bans in themselves, the housing crisis, the rental crisis and the homelessness crisis are all part of a supply crisis and unless we drive supply we will not solve any of those crises. That is what we are completely focused on, so people can have the homes they need - be those social, affordable, private, for purchase or for rent - in their local communities. What an eviction ban does is absolutely kill supply. It kills any hope of solving the housing crisis.

While I appreciate that it has been put forward as a populist measure to give people who find themselves in distressing circumstances false hope, the reality is-----

I apologise for interrupting, but as it is now 3 p.m., I am required to put the following question in accordance with the Order of the Seanad of this day: "That amendment No. 7 is hereby negatived in Committee, that section 3 is hereby agreed to in Committee, in respect of each of the sections undisposed of, the section is hereby agreed to in Committee, the Title is hereby agreed to in Committee, the Bill is accordingly reported to the House without amendment, Fourth Stage is hereby completed, the Bill is hereby received for final consideration and the Bill is hereby passed."