Around €87m of state money is paid to maintain people in substandard housing every year, it has been revealed.

Senator Paschal Donohoe's announcement follows the news one in five rental properties in Ireland are not meeting minimum legal standards.

"Recent statistics I obtained from the Department of Environment showed that 19% of all inspected rental properties nationwide are not meeting the minimum legal requirements," he said.

"The government is due to pay €461m this year in rent supplement to an estimated 74,000 people.

"Given that nearly one in five rental properties are legally below standard this means that €87m is being spent subsidising illegal accommodation."

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The senator said the situation is "wrong and represents very bad value for money".

"I recently highlighted the fact that one in three rental properties in Dublin did not meet minimum standards last year. It is completely unreasonable that the tax payer be asked to support this."

He said rogue landlords are causing "misery" to their tenants.

"More must be done to tackle this problem for the sake of tenants and to ensure that more is delivered when more than €400m of taxpayers’ money is being spent."

Mr Donohoe said the HSE and the Department of Environment must ensure that adequate enforcement personnel are in place to implement the revised rental standards.

The revenue raised in rental fines should be reinvested into local authorities to ensure that each one has adequate resources to tackle the issue, said the sentator.

"Guidelines must also be continually reviewed so that they reflect the reality of the current rental market."

(PR/KMcA)