I am not going to mince my words. The defective concrete scandal is a national emergency the Minister's Government wilfully mismanaged for over a decade. The Government has worked hard to fool the public and portray that we are being looked after, but the truth is we are now in the second failed scheme. My staff see suicidal ideation every week in our office. The uncertainty and the feeling of abandonment in this crisis has caused this. Some 40% of homeowners are living with severe depression. This is the reality and yet there is still no timeline for when IS 465 will be reviewed. Legislation for retrospective payments has still not been published since the grant amount was increased almost a year ago, despite the Minister, Deputy Browne, telling us it would be prioritised in June.

Let us talk about unethical engineering decisions that are still happening. Chartered engineers, under the original scheme, made recommendations for full demolition and yet chartered engineers from the Housing Agency continue to overturn them. People are being told their homes are safe when they are not. Complaints have been made to Engineers Ireland but the Government remains silent at the cost of people's health and safety. The truth is the Government has the power to fix this crisis today. It does not need to wait for the review of IS 465. The defective concrete has been trotted out as a poor excuse for inaction for far too long. The Government wrote the legislation in full knowledge of the obstacles it would present to accessing the scheme and continues to hide behind this to this day. Under Irish law the Government can declare a national emergency and issue ministerial guidance and fast-track legislation to address this crisis. The legal framework is there but the will to act is missing.

I need real answers and I would be grateful if the Minister would respectfully give them to me and those affected rather than running down the clock, as usually happens, with people looking over and wasting time. We need answers and we need them now. People are suffering and literally dying. This Government runs down the clock and delays things. Will the Minister and the Government use the powers under the Public Service Management Act 1997 to immediately issue ministerial guidelines to the Housing Agency to stop issuing partial fixes and ensure full remediation of affected homes? Will the Government use its ministerial authority to direct the Housing Agency to reinstate the engineers' original recommendations for further demolition, stop the madness of partial fixes that will fail in the future and follow the science? Finally, will there be legislation to ensure families who were early movers and were reassured they would not be disadvantaged be given the 10% retrospective payment they were meant to get and not be punished?

I thank Deputy Ward very much. I will try to be as succinct in my answers as his questions were. His first was whether or not the Government would use the Public Service Management Act. The answer to the question is "No". The Government will not use it because the defective concrete block grant scheme operates under its own primary legislation and in November 2024, following the receipt of preliminary results from scientific research in Donegal, the Department announced changes to the way the scheme works for certain homeowners. All homeowners who have been given a non-demolition option have been offered a choice of continuing with the work on their dwelling under the option determined or the option of a full technical review of their application by the Housing Agency. This review will be informed by the current research once the full review of the national standard is complete.

The Deputy's second question was on whether the Government would use its ministerial authority to direct the Housing Agency to reinstate original engineering recommendations. In response to that I would say an appeals panel has been established to assess appeals made under the Remediation of Dwellings Damaged by the Use of Defective Concrete Blocks Act. The panel offers those affected by decisions made by the Housing Agency and local authorities an opportunity to have their cases assessed by an independent group of industry experts. The points of appeal that are available to an applicant include the validation stage by the local authority, the damage threshold determination made by the Housing Agency, the remediation option and the grant amount approved and where a local authority refused to make a grant payment pursuant to a grant approval. It should be noted the appeals panel is statutorily independent in the performance of its functions.

It is independent of the Minister, the Department and, indeed, the Housing Agency.

The Deputy's final question was on whether families who were early movers in the scheme were told they would not be disadvantaged. He wants to know if the Government will pass the legislation to ensure that all homeowners receive the uplift in respect of rates and the cap retrospectively. The decision by the Government in 2021 was to the effect that applicants under the previous grant scheme would not be disadvantaged from being early movers and would benefit from the increased grant amounts that were available under the current scheme upon its commencement in 2023. This was allowed for in the 2022 Act under transitional provisions, and these early movers have benefited from the increased scheme cap and grant rates provided for.

I welcome the Deputy's direct and surgically focused questions. I just wanted to give him those answers as best I could in respect of the matter. I am conscious that he referred to legislation. I am instructed that legislation will be introduced as a priority in the forthcoming term. That is something the Government will give priority to.

We have unethical engineering going on in this scheme. That cannot be denied. A number of people were downgraded. They were granted full demolition. An engineer came out, did their job, examined it and then it was passed over to the Housing Agency. Someone in the agency looked at that fellow engineer's work and then downgraded it. This is unethical. It is unethical engineering. What is going on has been going on for some time. We suspect that this is widespread and that it will continue. How can we have engineers determining if something is a downgrade when we are reviewing IS 465? They are still coming downgrading people, even though we do not have the review of IS 465. Can the Government please put something in place to suspend this in order that these people will have a chance to get their reviews done properly and not when we are in the middle of a review of IS 465?

I will talk to the Minister for housing who has responsibility for this matter. I will raise with him the issues the Deputy has identified. The Deputy stated that there is unethical engineering ongoing in Donegal. If that is the case, there are mechanisms in place to report engineers who are acting unethically. I urge people who believe they are the victims of unethical engineering to use the appropriate mechanism to report engineers involved in that type of activity. We have an institute of engineers in Ireland. That body regulates engineering performance and anyone engaged in unethical behaviour should be brought to its attention.

In the context of the issue of defective concrete blocks, from speaking to Deputies McConalogue and Gallagher, I am conscious of the impact this is having in Donegal. The Government has not been found wanting when it comes to providing money to resolve this matter via the scheme. A huge amount of money has been made available in the past and more will be available in the future.