Batt O'Keeffe (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)

Up to 31 December 2008, the board had made awards in the case of 11,848 applicants. A further 699 cases have been withdrawn, refused or have resulted in no award being made. This leaves a balance of 2,047 cases remaining to be processed. The overall average award from the inception of the scheme is €64,892. Based on the number of applications received, the final cost of the scheme may be €1.1 billion, including legal and administrative costs, which are now running at approximately 28% of awards.

Any estimate of the final cost of the scheme at this point will, of course, be tentative as there are approximately 2,047 outstanding cases at present. As the board generally clears between 200 and 220 cases per month, it is estimated that the remaining cases will be processed by the end of 2009.

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