Richard O'Donoghue (Limerick County, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for coming in. Mr. Benson said the engineer is not responsible for the foundations he does not put in. He is wrong. The engineer is responsible for the foundations on top of which he puts a structure. He is completely wrong in the information he just gave. Any engineer who has put a structure on top of an existing foundation is required to do all the tests to the existing foundation before he designs the product for it. That means he is giving an undertaking that the foundation in place is adequate and correct for the construction of the building he is putting on top of it. He has to sign off on it. If he does not sign off on it, the insurance will not accept it. I know this because I am in construction. I am involved in renovations every day of the week and it is a standard practice. What Mr. Benson is saying is wrong.

Mr. Benson said he has been involved in the issue of pyrite since 2013. Why was a quarry making and delivering blocks around County Limerick and County Clare that now has 1,000 cases against it for houses on its own books? As I am a bricklayer by trade, I understand. Mr. Benson spoke about the difference in trades and workmanship. Every section of every building we have ever done is overseen by competent engineers and other skilled people and if it is not right, they take it down. It is all tested using certified materials.

I made a suggestion at the last committee meeting and you said you would listen to it. Ireland recently had a census. Every building that is due to get an SEAI grant gets cored, something the Department trying to drop out of this Bill. The easiest way to test for pyrite is to use a chisel and chisel areas out or use a core which gives the full details of the blocks going through. If we do not do a census of all the houses we are now retrofitting and insulation gets pumped on top of existing insulation making the mica travel from one side to the other, we will create a bigger problem for everybody down the line. That is common sense.

Others can have titles and letters after their names, but I am dealing with this on a daily basis. I can draw up plans and hand them to the structural engineer. He will specify what has to go in and he hands it back to me to carry out the work with the proper materials. In order to future-proof Ireland, the block work needs to be tested for every house that is going in for an SEAI grant, such as external insulation or cavity insulation. It is a small price to pay. We should then have a census in every county. I welcome that Limerick and Clare have been included in it now.

As I said, I have been involved in building for over 30 years. The same quarry has also provided blocks for public buildings. We are talking about homeowners, we will now be talking about schools and public buildings after this where these same blocks had been supplied. It was allowed to bring blocks from the quarry 12 months ago. It only stopped 12 months ago. It now owns most of the quarries around this country and is bringing blocks from different quarries. Thank God, I never used its blocks on any of my one-off houses.

Foundations have gone in on rafts and the material is underneath the raft foundation. Any house with an infill of over 900 mm is required to use a precast slab but most people did the infill anyway and put the precast slab over it to get rid of the void. Some people actually put a liquid screed on top of that afterwards to seal it. It depended on the specification of each individual engineer. That makes common sense. All house owners since 2002 have already paid tax on their houses at 13.5%. Any house, back to €80 per square foot in the 2000s up to whenever the rate went up, already paid €20,000 or €30,000 in tax. In this, the VAT is included in the build. On a €420,000 house, there is €49,996 VAT that is not going to them. The maximum redress is not, as Mr. Benson has said, €420,000, it is actually €370,004.40. On a 2,000 sq. ft house, it is €3,600 at today's rate of €1.80 per square foot. I know that is today's rate because I deal with it on a daily basis. That is a fact. Mr. Benson has it is €1.56 to €1.61. He is way off. In addition, the Department is taking the €50,000 tax back. We need 100% redress. The 100% redress means taking the VAT off to ensure that people can get their houses built to current standards which is what we want.

What engineer will design and build on top of a foundation he would not check out first?