As things stand, many homeowners affected by defective concrete blocks are unable to access working capital loans from the banks to start the remedial works on their houses. Aside from the well-documented shortcomings of the scheme, such people simply cannot afford to access it. They need invoices for €100,000 of completed work to have grant funding released by the local authorities under the redress scheme. Having met today with representatives of the Banking Payments Federation of Ireland, BPFI, I welcome their proposal. That proposal has gone to the Government. Has the Minister had sight of the proposal? How quickly can the Government approve it so that it begins to work for people? The proposal must be fast-tracked. Will the Minister commit to ensuring it is in place as quickly as possible?

I thank the Deputy. The enhanced defective concrete block scheme is up and running and we are seeing an increase in applications every week. We want to ensure that finance is not a barrier for people accessing the scheme. I have also discussed the matter with the BPFI and the Department of Finance is involved. I have not seen the detailed proposal yet. I believe it has come in very recently. I heard the chief executive, Mr. Brian Hayes, discuss the issue. Any proposal for assistance we can give to homeowners to access the scheme in the short term will be looked at positively but I will wait to see the detail of the BPFI proposal.

I welcome its intervention and this is something we have discussed with it. The Department of Finance will play quite a significant role in this too but I will keep the House informed.