Defective housing working group
Deputy Pringle criticised delays in publishing the membership and terms of reference of the defective housing working group and said affected homeowners in Donegal are waiting. The Tánaiste said he would speak to the Housing Minister and ask him to respond directly.
On 16 February, the Tánaiste's colleague, the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage, Deputy O'Brien, brought a memorandum to Cabinet announcing the establishment of the independent working group to examine defective housing. To date, there has been no publication of either the membership of this working group or its terms of reference. This is despite the Minister, Deputy O'Brien, promising that the group would be up and running in quarter one of this year and the programme for Government promising it would report by July.
In Donegal, I am inundated with calls, letters and email from mica-affected constituents who are at the end of their tether with the scheme that was brought in by the former Minister, Mr. Eoghan Murphy, and the Minister for Finance, Deputy Donohoe. It is not working for them. They are hoping that this group's work will be able to offer them solutions to the problems they are encountering. They are not complaining and looking for a handout. They are suggesting innovative solutions and ideas that will help them if the group engages with and listens to them, but first it needs to be operational. When will the terms of reference of the working group be brought before the House and when will we see action, not more broken promises?
Comment on this
I thank the Deputy. I am familiar with the issue of mica in Donegal and in Mayo and I have been in houses in Donegal that have been affected. Unfortunately, I am not up to date on where we are in terms of the scheme and the working group. I will be talking to the Minister, Deputy O'Brien, either today or tomorrow.
I will let him know that the Deputy raised it here and ask him to respond directly.