Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)
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I asked whether the Department had analysed the objective level of demand, that being, an audit of everyone living in substandard mobiles. If so, what was the number? In Galway, the number of loans allocated has not met the requirement. We need hard information. Ms Timmons stated that a good number of the units – I cannot remember the exact figure – were second-hand. We are all hung up on A-rated houses, but the units in question are not rated C, D, E or even F. What age are these second-hand caravans? It is all right to tie up a caravan behind a car and go off in the middle of summer to Ballybunion, Connemara or somewhere to stay there for a week in the caravan, but the situation is a lot different when the frost comes. Why are we not funding new mobiles that would have a longer useable life cycle? Do we have objective knowledge of the demand that we should be meeting, why is it not all being met and why are people not being given sufficient funding? In Galway, they were apparently told that they had to go to the same supplier. Is that correct?