This is a question to the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government on what may be as many as 5,000 homeowners in Donegal who were affected by defective Mica blocks. In December 2015, as I have outlined to the Minister in the Dáil on many occasions, a panel was formed by the Government to assess the situation and it reported more than a year ago. Recently, a National Standards Authority of Ireland report was published outlining a range of options to remediate the homes, including removing the outer leaf of the wall to complete demolition of the house, depending on how badly it is affected. The bottom line is that there needs to be a redress scheme to help those homeowners fix their homes. The Minister has continuously tried to avoid dealing with this issue. Will he ensure there is a line in the budget this year to help those homeowners, who want to get on with their lives and address this massive problem by which they have been unfortunate enough to be affected? Will he ensure that a scheme and funding are put in place this year to help them?

I thank the Deputy for the question, which is of serious concern to him and his constituents. The Minister of State with responsibility for Gaeilge, Gaeltachtaí and the islands, Deputy Joe McHugh, and the Minister of State at the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government, Deputy Damien English, are in constant contact on this. We had an expert panel that made a number of recommendations. We are progressing the first two recommendations at the moment. We are also consulting on what we can do to implement the further recommendations. Those conversations will continue between now and the budget.