Introduction

Thank you, Chairperson and Members, for the invitation to attend this afternoon. I am Rosemary Steen, and I am the Director of the Residential Tenancies Board. I am accompanied by my colleagues Ms Louise Loughlin, Deputy Director at the RTB and Ms Emer Morrissey, Head of Compliance and Enforcement at the RTB. We will be happy to answer Members’ questions, but first I would like to read a short Opening Statement and respond to the issue raised in your letter of invitation.

RTB role and remit

The RTB was established under the Residential Tenancies Act, 2004. We are an independent, public body operating under the aegis of the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage. Our role covers four key areas that include:

  1. Maintaining a register of tenancies.
  2. Providing a dispute resolution service, primarily for landlords and tenants.
  3. Ensuring compliance with rental law.
  4. Providing information, research, data and insights to inform policy.

Differences between RTB and CSO data

Maintaining an accurate register of tenancies, and ensuring that every tenancy that should be registered is registered, are key priorities for the RTB.

We shared this Committee’s concern when Census 2022 data reported a higher number of households living in private rented accommodation on 3 rd April 2022 than we observed on the RTB Register of Private Tenancies on 31st December 2022. We wanted to understand the reasons for this difference, and we were pleased to engage with the Central Statistics Office (CSO) on a research study that would provide answers to this question. Due to its access to a wide range of administrative data sources, the CSO was uniquely positioned to conduct this research.

This July, we welcomed the publication of the CSO Frontier Series Research Paper ‘Rented from Private Landlords 2022’ which, for the first time, provided greater insights into the difference between the data sets.

As the Committee is aware, following an extensive data matching exercise, the CSO identified 73,002 tenancies that were not registered with the RTB. Of these, 25,248 were classified as possible ‘formal’ rental arrangements that probably should be registered with the RTB. The remaining 47,754 were classified as possible ‘informal’ rental arrangements that are likely to be outside the scope of RTB regulations.

Compliance with the requirement to register a tenancy

I, as the Director of the RTB, together with my colleagues, take any non-compliance with the requirement to register a tenancy very seriously.

Under the Residential Tenancies Act 2004 to 2024, the RTB has two mechanisms to address registration non-compliance. The first is investigation under Part 7A, which can result in a civil sanction of up to €15,000. The second is criminal prosecution under Section 144, which can result in a criminal prosecution and/or a fine of up to €4,000.

As the RTB’s new Director, I have outlined my determination to use the RTB’s full powers to investigate and sanction, or to prosecute non-compliant landlords as required. We are already taking several steps to increase our compliance and enforcement activities in this area, including targeted compliance campaigns and building our capacity to identify and pursue unregistered landlords.

Targeted compliance campaigns

Under the Statistics Act, the CSO cannot provide the RTB with a list of potentially noncompliant landlords, they have however highlighted several geographic areas where a high percentage of unmatched possible informal and formal rental arrangements were identified. These areas, which include counties Donegal, Cavan, Monaghan, Galway and Clare, will be targeted as part of a new RTB registration compliance campaign between November 2024 and March 2025.

Last week, I wrote to the Chief Executives of these local authorities to request their support in planning and delivering a public information campaign to encourage landlords to register tenancies in their area. While our primary concern is the 25,248 possible formal rental arrangements that should be registered with the RTB, these compliance campaigns will also target areas where informal rental arrangements are prevalent. It is important to underline that our primary objective is to reach full compliance in everybody’s best interest. Therefore, public information campaigns play an important role in achieving compliance and avoiding any suggestion of a lack of knowledge or awareness.

Building our capacity to identify and pursue unregistered landlords

The RTB is also working to increase our capacity to identify unregistered tenancies through data sharing with other Government departments. We currently receive data from the Department of Social Protection and on landlords in receipt of Housing Assistance Payment (HAP). We have also worked with the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage on a proposed amendment to the Residential Tenancies Act that will allow for additional data sharing with the Revenue Commissioners to identify potential non-compliance.

In August 2024 we compared HAP and other referral data with our tenancy registration data and identified 1,500 records that did not match any RTB registration. Last week we launched a new campaign as part of which we are writing to those identified to give them the opportunity to register their tenancy. Under the Residential Tenancies Act, we are required to write to the landlord on two occasions to offer them the chance to comply with the requirement to register. Landlords who do not respond to the second notice will be subject to prosecution. Our message is quite simple. We will help and facilitate all those who wish to be compliant to do so. For those who remain non-compliant we will use all of our significant powers to identify such landlords and enforce the regulations.

I would like to conclude by noting my appreciation for the CSO’s support in conducting this research which has provided us with incredibly valuable information. We greatly value our partnership with the CSO, which has generated insights that are helping to drive our new and energised approach, where research informs and helps to deliver a more targeted approach to the RTB’s compliance and enforcement activities.

Finally, I would like to thank the Committee for the opportunity to discuss this issue here today. We look forward to addressing any questions that Committee members may have.