Richard O'Donoghue (Limerick County, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank all the groups from Donegal, Sligo, Mayo, Clare and Limerick. If the Minister looks up he will see that the Gallery is full. It is a long time since we have seen it as full as that. I hope he takes heed of that and of the amount of work those people have put in. I also thank my colleagues on the housing committee, who have spent long hours debating this legislation with the Minister's Department. I am disgusted that the Department was too afraid to sit down with me and my colleagues for another six hours to have a proper debate on the real housing costs for the people in the Gallery and all the people in this country.

The amendments I submitted were ruled out of order on the basis of a cost to the Exchequer. I will touch very vaguely on one of them, around foundations. In the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s, concrete foundations were put in at a maximum of 20 Newtons. At the time, if someone did not have the proper machinery, the lorry driver could add an extra drop of water, which would reduce the foundations to 15 Newtons. Today, any foundations are put in at 30 Newtons. The Minister wants us to rebuild houses on foundations that are 10 or 15 Newtons less than what is being put in at the moment by competent engineers around this country. That is what the Minister is telling these people. He is saying we should rebuild on top of something that is completely out of context from the point of view of strength and what engineers are asking us to put in. That is what the Minister is asking us to do. That will not save the Exchequer money because in a number of years the foundations he has asked people to build on will probably be structurally unsound because of all the interference and the structural work that will have to be done on top of them. What are we going to do - go back and rebuild them?

I have asked for core testing to be done before any retrofitting is done to any property in this country, to ensure we have a full prognosis on the number of houses suffering from pyrite. Again, that amendment has been ruled out of order. It is common sense to spend about €1,500 on core testing houses to save the Exchequer money into the future, rather than retrofitting the houses and having to knock them afterwards. The Government spending more taxpayer's money on retrofitting houses and then having to knock them down is not cost-effective. Testing foundations costs €5,000 at the moment. To replace the foundation costs about €8,000. Common sense says we should get them tested and remove the foundations, otherwise it will turn into €13,000.

The Minister should look up at these people in the Gallery and remember them because they have relations all around the country. It is not only the people with pyrite who are affected but every family. All I can do is voice my disgust that the Department would not sit down with the committee, even though we asked it to. We would have stayed day and night to discuss this to make sure it was right but the Department would not take the experience of a building contractor. I have been working on buildings since the late 1980s and I have given the Department my building experience. No one from the Department could answer me on the day we debated this. They could only say that it was not in their remit or that it was somebody else's department. That is all we got, going around in circles. The Department would not take real live common sense and real live building experience from me. I am not sure if I am the only contractor here. I am a blocklayer by trade.

I understand blocks. The Minister would not take advice from the likes of me and my colleagues who have fought for this to make sure we got the right redress for these people, their families and the next generation. Shame on the Minister if he guillotines this without tabling the proper amendments and corrections, which we offered to help him with.

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