Cormac Devlin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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Staying with the issue of survivors and their applications, I know the witnesses will not go into any individual case nor will I. I will just highlight one without identifying anybody. I note that home improvements accounted for €68.1 million of expenditure. Last summer, in respect of the staying at home, home help and tenants support scheme, I made contact with Caranua on behalf of a survivor. This individual is living in a family home that happened to be rented from the local authority. Therefore, there seemed to be a bit of an issue. I wondered about it at the time so it is opportune for me to ask how many other individuals found that difficult. It was a kitchen upgrade because the property, which I saw myself, required that but that individual found it very difficult to access what I call their funds. How was that the case? Ms Downes has stated there is a complaints mechanism and that there were two complaints this year. How many complaints have been made since 2013? One should remember that some of these people are extremely vulnerable individuals who are not used to articulating or are sometimes unable to articulate their concerns and, therefore, some of them might turn to public representatives.