Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

In fairness to the expert panel, regardless of how long it took to set it up, it has worked quite fast. It was only announced in April but it has already been in Donegal and has met nine families and many others who are involved in the situation, so it is well on top of the brief. We will all meet at some point. I have not had a chance as Minister of State to sit down with the panel, but we will do that very shortly and I will commit here and now to visiting affected families in Donegal. I have seen the effects that difficulties like pyrite can have. I know what it is like, having dealt with it in my own county as well, so we will certainly meet them.

It is important that we let the expert panel do its work. The whole basis of any solution for all affected parties is to let the experts do their work first of all. They will analyse the report and will engage with all of us. The mica group itself says there are 284 members it knows of whose households are affected. There is talk of thousands; we do not know whether the figures are true or false. All I know is that about 300 have identified themselves as having difficulties. The expert panel is moving fast already. It has said it needs six months but I think it might beat that target. We are already a month into the six-month period.

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