Mr. Michael Doherty:

I am from Donegal and am the PRO of the Mica Action Group. We have around 7,000 affected homes. These primarily arose during the Celtic tiger years. Self-regulation of manufacturers, together with inadequate local authority enforcement of standards, allowed unfit concrete blocks to enter the Irish market for years. The regulations that should have protected consumers did not do so and homeowners were unknowingly exposed to defective products destined to fail on the biggest and most significant purchases of their lives.

In desperation, we chased the quarry owners, insurance companies and those that provide bonds on our homes. We chased the banks for help. No one would help us. No one was interested. We had no option but to chase the State that allowed this disaster to unfold, albeit unknowingly – or was it? In 2014, we made the State aware of the issue with evidence submitted to Donegal County Council. Minutes have been provided. It took until 2020 for a scheme to arrive. A so-called 90-10 scheme would end up akin to a 60-40 scheme, costing the average homeowner more than €100,000 for demolition and rebuild. That was if you could afford to access the scheme in the first place. That scheme was correctly rejected.

A massive campaign saw over 20,000 people arrive on the streets of Dublin on 15 June and 8 October 2021. Our demand was 100% redress, no less. As a result, the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage, Deputy Darragh O’Brien, set up a working group over the summer months. It was meant to facilitate a solution but instead saw the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage defend its old 90-10 scheme. No progress was made because it was thwarted and stymied by the attitude and actions of the Department. We soon realised we were seen less as victims and more as chancers or opportunists looking to get something for nothing. All we wanted were our homes back on a like-for-like basis, only what we had already paid for.

That was not an unreasonable request, especially when we look at the nearest precedent available, namely, the pyrite remediation scheme, mainly in Leinster. These homeowners were provided with true like-for-like replacement, including house finishes, end-to-end contract management by the State and zero cost to the homeowner. Instead, we are offered a grant to fix our homes, leaving us to find contractors who will work to the grants provided, which are wholly inadequate. The inflationary world we live in is all at the homeowner’s exposure, none of it at the State’s.

To further frustrate the process, the Department has red tape to the nth degree as regards terms and conditions and caps and exclusions which leave this scheme unworkable. Members will hear them tell us that the rates are independent and fair, as they came through the Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland, SCSI. The reality is that the SCSI was dictated to under the terms of reference, which create a significant difference between eligible costs and true costs. This inhibits any chance of 100% redress. Examples are 15-year-old standards leaving us to make up the differences and not even a carpet allowed for in the home by way of finish; no allowance for the replacement of foundations which are made of the same deleterious materials as are in the defective blocks; and no allowance for other defective block structures like walls and garages, all equally capable of killing members of our family as they subside and fall over time. Real costs versus allowable costs at current rates represent more like an 80% grant.

This leaves homeowners out tens of thousands of euros - a shortfall we simply cannot afford.

To compensate, homeowners requested a penalty-free downsizing option that would allow the grant based on their current home size to be redirected to building themselves a smaller home for the money. Instead, Government saw fit to hold back on the grant amount it was prepared to give and instead provide a grant against the smaller home, leaving the homeowner with the same problem and still out tens of thousands of euros, still trapped and unable to afford to rebuild.

The committee will hear of science today, or the lack of it, in the assessment and categorisation of our homes. The IS 465 protocol has not allowed for the inclusion of other pertinent deleterious materials such as pyrrhotite. It has not allowed for the testing of foundations that our experts will show is playing with fire and will ultimately cost the State more in the long run.

We have excluded homes. Many of our rental homes are not eligible. Small buy-to-let landlords cannot afford to replace these homes and their tenants have nowhere to go. Holiday and retirement homes, some inherited homes and homes occupied by vulnerable adults that are not classed as principal private residences are excluded from the scheme as it stands. These are equally innocent victims of unfit products entering the market for years. While they are not demanding they get pushed in front of others, they are rightly demanding that they are not excluded from the scheme. Prioritisation, yes; exclusion, no.

We have identified 35 different issues in the general scheme, all of which to a greater or lesser extent render the scheme unworkable. These are tabled in the submission. Many of these were heavily debated and negotiated over the past six months between homeowner representatives and officials. The negotiation was undertaken in good faith on the part of the homeowners and progress appeared to be made. However, the Department continues to attempt to exert what can only be described as coercive control over the homeowners as opposed to seeking a solution-based approach. Families are stressed to breaking point. They have endured years of uncertainty and anxiety of every possible description. The scheme should be a way out of this nightmare. Instead, its inflexible, cynical, illogical and blinkered approach is burdening homeowners with yet more stress. Where is the empathy from the State? Why would the State not allow homeowners to downsize without penalty when it comes at no additional cost? This is not 100% redress, despite what the State might claim. Homeowners will be out tens of thousands of euros with some cases amounting to six-figure sums. The caps are discriminatory and must be adjusted to take into account our current environment if not completely eliminated.

Ignoring the science is a cheap sticking-plaster solution that will drive homeowners through this nightmare not once but twice in their lifetime. Innocent victims are abandoned under current exclusions and our demand is that ultimately no homeowner with a property including defective concrete blocks, DCB, should be left behind and we want that in writing. We implore the committee to study the submissions and after today’s scrutiny, forward recommendations to the Minister that address these key issues. After ten years of heartache, allow us a path to restore our lives, a path to true 100% redress and no less.