The changes will increase rents for all tenants in DCC social housing, but are projected to affect households with higher incomes and multiple earners the most.

The rate of increase will depend on household size and income. Under the new model, a principal earner in a single occupant household earning a net income of €244 a week can expect their weekly rent to rise 10pc, from €31.80 to €34.92.

For a household with one principal earner on €961 a week and two adult subsidiary earners with a collective income of €900 a week, their weekly rent would increase 35pc from €181 to €244.

With more subsidiary earners in the equation, the increase could climb well beyond 50pc.

At the moment, rents are charged at 15pc of the principal earner’s salary, with the first €32 a week exempt from this calculation, and subsidiary earners are charged in the same way up to a maximum of €21 a week.

Up to four subsidiary earners can be included in the calculation, but the fifth and onwards don’t count towards the rental figure. For self-employed tenants like taxi drivers and tradespeople, the council currently assumes that they earn either €500 or €560 a week.

These figures are all set to increase, with the primary earner now set for an 18pc rate on everything exceeding the first €50 a week. Subsidiary earners will also now contribute up to €40 a week, with the four-person cap lifted.

Councillors voted tonight by 31 to 30 to pass its €1.7bn budget as a protest was held outside Dublin City Hall by Sinn Féin, the Social Democrats, tenants’ union CATU and others, over the rent increases.

People Before Profit Solidarity group leader, councillor Conor Reddy had proposed an amendment to the budget which would introduce an almost 15pc increase in commercial rates for large rate-payers instead of increasing rents for council tenants. However, the amendment was defeated.

Speaking ahead of the meeting, Sinn Féin councillor Daithí Doolan said the increases were “hitting working families front and centre”.

“We need to remember folks why is there going to be a rent increase,” he said. “Last month, the Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael government were backslapping each other with a historic budget surplus of over €9bn.

“They couldn’t spend the money if they tried. And they’re denying us funding for this city. They’re starving this city of essential funding for housing maintenance, repairs, regeneration and redevelopment of our working class estates.”

DCC social housing resident Pauline McAdams said it was unfair to “penalise tenants” for the council’s failure to maintain their housing stock.

“Who’s going to guarantee that these repairs are going to be done,” she said. “And how are people going to pay these rents when they put them up,” adding that the people affected by the changes come from low-income families.

Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, Labour and the Greens have 31 seats on Dublin City Council, shy of an overall majority. Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are reliant on Labour and Green support.

Speaking ahead of the vote, Green Party councillor Michael Pidgeon said he agreed that conditions in council complexes were “not acceptable”, and that’s why the budget for maintenance needed to increase.

“Dublin City Council, along with the other Dublin councils, really charge, with good intentions, some of the lowest social housing rents in the country,” he said, adding that the system was “bizarre and regressive” because “richer households pay less than poorer ones”.

Mr Pidgeon said that the ultimate result of the current system was that maintenance budgets were too low.

He said it was not the responsibility of Government to fund maintenance budgets for local authorities, and that councils should set rents at an appropriate level to cover it.

“There is a clear, direct line between the low rents we charge and the low, crappy levels of maintenance we provide,” he said.

A People Before Profit amendment that would have increased commercial rates to large rate-payers instead of increasing rents was narrowly defeated by the chamber, by a margin of 31 against and 28 in favour, with one abstention.

Funded by the Local Democracy Reporting Scheme