Sinn Féin’s Pearse Doherty challenged Leo Varadkar on Housing
It comes as new laws linking rent increases to inflation will be in place within a week, according to the Minister for Housing.
Cabinet has approved the new rules which will replace the current annual 4% increase allowed under Rent Pressure Zone (RPZ) legislation.
Moving forward, RPZ increases can be no higher than the general inflation recorded in the Harmonised Index of Consumer Prices (HICP) – which currently stands at just under 2%.
On Newstalk Breakfast this morning, Housing Minister Darragh O’Brien said permitted increases would have been lower in previous years.
“If you look at inflation over the last three years, that averages around 0.73% per annum – so just under one-quarter of 1%,” he said.
“So, instead of a 4% increase that some tenants would have borne because that was the maximum – the maximum over the last three years would have been under 1%.
“Now, currently, inflation is running a bit higher than that but we are still looking at about 1.9%”
Credit to : NewsTalk