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Retailers call for extended ban on rent review

Thursday, 11 March 2010

UNDER pressure retail tenants in the city's most exclusive shopping area have called on the Government to retrospectively ban upward only rent reviews by landlords. Justice Minister Dermot Ahern pushed through legislation late last year to make provision for a limited ban on upward only rent reviews. But it had no retrospective power and therefore only applies to a certain number of agreements. The chairman of the Grafton Street Tenants’ Association, John Corcoran, said hundreds of businesses around the city that are already locked into rent agreements with their landlords are in danger of closure because the new legalisation does not cover them. “On Grafton Street alone there are a large number of shops that are empty,” he said. “There are also a large number that are for sale. “In other cases tenants are negotiating with landlords for rent reductions. It is really a dysfunctional situation that because of upwards only rent reviews, rents can't come down. “The last increase we got, which was five years ago, was 120 per cent,” he added. “The previous review, five years before that, the rent went up 80 per cent. We are due a review on April 1 this year. The scale of these increases is immense and there are no upper limits.” He further warned: “Many businesses are in serious danger of having to close down because of this. We urgently need legislation that will ban upward rent reviews retrospectively.” Cllr Kevin Humphreys (Lab) has also called on Justice Minister Dermot Ahern to enact legislation that would retrospectively ban upward only rent reviews. “There are now hundreds of retail units lying idle across our cities and towns due to ridiculous high rents,” he said. “I am calling on the minister to urgently introduce further legislation to place a ban on all upward-only retail rent reviews.” Damien Cassidy of the National Conservation and Heritage Trust, which has campaigned for the preservation of historic businesses in areas such as Grafton Street, has called for an inflation linked cap on retail rent increases. “We are recommending that the minister does not interfere with the constitutional rights of landlords but instead puts a cap on rent reviews,” he said. “Such a cap would mean there could be no increase other than one which was in line with the cost of living index.” A spokesperson for the Department of Justice said Minister Ahern has established a working group to look at the issue of commercial rent reviews. “The group will be asked to focus particularly on the arbitration process and the adequacy of the information available to all parties in the context of commercial rent reviews,” she said.