Sorca Clarke (Longford-Westmeath, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Today, I have again been speaking to residents from The Oaks in County Westmeath and I commend their perseverance, doggedness and determination to see this through. In 2010, the 32 homes had their insurance cancelled due to identified fire and construction defects. A recent minor but problematic flood damaged walls, floors and furniture and none of it was insured. I am told that The Oaks was inspected by the local authority and two notices were served on the developer, followed by a court case in 2010. The judge ruled that the matter was too serious for the District Court. The local authority said it would take six weeks to prepare a case and requested the case be struck out, and it was, but the situation remained. The residents thought that, following a fire in the development in early 2021, the local authority would finally act definitively, but that was not to be and the situation remains still.

The residents of The Oaks have been extremely proactive in attempting to resolve this issue but they have effectively been stonewalled. They do not have a wishlist of outlandish requirements. They want their homes to be safe, to be compliant, to be insurable and to be saleable. As one resident said to me this afternoon:

I am a mother of three, one of whom is autistic. We bought a one-bedroom apartment in 2007. In 2009 we received news about the fire safety issues. We have been renting and paying a mortgage since 2009. We have moved at least ten times. With the rising cost of living, we may have no other option but to move back into that deathtrap. This is a noose around our neck that keeps on tightening.

That light-touch regulation introduced by Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil, and widespread shoddy practice by the building industry during the Celtic tiger, led to these building defects. This Government and previous Governments have failed to deal with that legacy and the practices they facilitated, yet it is residents like those in The Oaks and those in the Visitors Gallery this evening who are left to face the full impact of the failures of others. That is shameful.

See this speech in context