Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank all presenters. Starting with Mr. Forde, and focusing on the recommendation of the expert group concerning the damage threshold, there is concern that this aspect is going to be used to exclude homeowners rather than anything else. This concern is exacerbated by the specific citing of work completed by Mayo County Council on the damage threshold. I am sure Mr. Forde is aware that Mayo County Council proposed to exclude 20 homeowners from the current scheme last August. On taking an independent appeal, 19 of those people won their cases. Mr. Forde may not be aware, however, that the county council, when sending out an engineer earlier this year to assess new applications from homeowners, sent someone who was not I.S. 465 qualified. In that context, he will understand that people are experiencing weariness and a lack of confidence in Mayo County Council regarding the damage threshold issue. Will Mr. Forde share the work that Mayo County Council prepared for the expert working group? It is not cited, but just referred to in the report. Will the damage threshold differ depending on whether a situation involves pyrite, mica or pyrrhotite?

This leads me on to the issue of pyrrhotite. Given Mr. Forde's experience in this area, and he is highly regarded in respect of his expertise, what is his view on this issue? We heard evidence in the last session that it is extremely prevalent and exceptionally corrosive. I would like to hear Mr. Forde's thoughts on this aspect, given his experience in this regard.

Turning to the process for admitting other counties, and we know there are at least 12 more counties involved, people in County Sligo have been waiting for some time. They are very frustrated by the process. We had the experience of people in Clare as well, who were forced to go through many hoops, as we heard about earlier. All the time this is happening - and I need everybody to understand this - it is adding to the stress experienced by each homeowner. These are homeowners, families and people whose entire lives have been turned upside down through no fault of their own. This is what we must all keep in our minds during all the work we are doing on this. This is not about facts and figures; it is about people.