Sir, – Prof PJ Drudy (November 2nd) talks of "introducing a fair system of rent regulation similar to that throughout Europe and Scandinavia".
Institutional investors throughout Europe see social housing as an attractive long-term investment offering a secure and inflation-proof income while tenants welcome the security of long-term tenure with protection from cavalier rent increases.
However, Prof Drudy neglects to mention that, throughout Europe, rent regulation includes legal provisions to ensure that landlords, unlike in Ireland, have little difficulty or delay in recovering possession from tenants who indulge in anti-social behaviour or who fail to pay their rent.
Introduction of similar provisions in Ireland should be an essential quid pro quo for any form of rent regulation. Given the current reluctance to pay social welfare rent allowances direct to landlords, such "politically incorrect" provisions seem likely to be resisted tooth and nail.
Without such provisions, risk-averse institutional investors will not be attracted to the sector. – Yours, etc,
TED MOONEY,
Dublin 6.