Ruairi Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

It seems that Fórsa has achieved a roadmap to job evaluation for its members in local authorities, which could mean the end of the industrial action. That is very positive except for those people who will now have to take calls and emails from me.

If we are talking about housing, we know we need to see a complete escalation in respect of modern methods of construction. However, I wish to deal with the issue of housing adaptation grants for older people and those with disabilities. Louth County Council got a small amount of money to reopen for applications, for which it had shut, in the next while. At this point, however, we are still looking at something like an 18-month backlog. We know that a review is happening locally. There is also a review happening at Government level. We need to see the outworking of that. We need to look at thresholds because we are talking about trying to deal with people who are suffering in respect, in particular, of mobility issues. We need something that is more fit for purpose, which means the announcement of thresholds and a process for which to do this.

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