Ms Angela Denning:

They all came in on budget except that we retained the risk for latent defects in buildings when the tender issued. These were all historic buildings and the National Development Finance Agency, NDFA, advised us that we should retain the risk for latent defects in order that we would have a good tender and in order that the prices would come in at a reasonable level. If the developers took on that risk, the tender prices would be significantly higher. When the buildings were completed, a number of claims were submitted for latent defects. The NDFA dealt with those. Out of 14 categories of claim, only three were allowed, and that claim was settled for €8.9 million to be paid over three years. That is additional to the tender price. That said, we saved in excess of €5 million because of the timing of the delivery of the courthouses, so it represents an additional €3.9 million to be paid over three years.

That is to deal with things like what happened in Mullingar when they took casings off the walls and discovered that there was a structural problem.