Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

With regard to the fires, when we did the site visit there this time last year I was informed that day that there had been an extraordinary number of fires on the site up to that date. We were there last June. That has continued. We will seek clarification on that and on the damages in terms of the financial cost of it. Is it in any way feeding into these claims? Is the cost of it being picked up by the contractor? Ultimately, the contractor would be responsible for both security and staff on the site. It is a very unusual situation, to put it mildly.

There is €585 million in claims made by the contractor at this point. Only €22 million has been settled so far. It is only a tiny percentage that has been put to bed. The final price of this is hard to pin down at this point, but the least we are entitled to is to be given figures regarding the parameters they are working to. We will seek that.