Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)

There is a real crisis for people living in unsafe homes with defective concrete blocks. That crisis is far from over, despite what the Government may think. People are still living in fear every time there is a red weather warning, forced to watch as cracks spread and walls shift, as their home crumbles right around them. The Ulster University study summed it up best when it described it as an earthquake in slow motion. The study laid bare the real toll of this crisis, the mental health toll, the trauma, the stress and the long-term harm that is happening every day to my constituents and those living elsewhere. That is what families are enduring while the Government drags its feet.

The State's failure to regulate created the disaster and now the State is failing all over again. The scheme that is in place excludes so many people that it will never address the crisis. I will give an example of the sort of call I receive regularly to my office. Someone was in touch with my office just last week, a family in Donegal who live in a semi-detached home. Both their house and their neighbours' home have defective blocks. One house is recommended for demolition and the other recommended for remedial work. Both were built at the same time and with the same blocks. It is madness. This is the kind of mad stuff that is coming back. No builder will ever agree to take on that job and so the families in both houses are trapped. They cannot move forward and cannot rebuild. Many others simply do not have the money to even enter the process. They are left living in crumbling homes without any hope.

The impact of this crisis goes far beyond homes with defective concrete blocks. Schools, childcare facilities and community centres are all affected by this crisis - all left behind and abandoned by Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael Governments. Deputies need to do the right thing today and vote for this motion tabled by Charles Ward, which we support.

The property market is left in chaos in my county and elsewhere because people cannot sell or buy homes, all because homes are unfairly deemed unmortgageable in some circumstances or uninsurable based on bad science and laptop studies. The Government continues to wash its hands of this issue.

Today, the CSO reported that Inishowen in Donegal, which is the epicentre of this crisis, has the most people living on low incomes. It is no coincidence that Donegal is one of the most deprived areas and has the most victims as a result of this scandal because this would never be allowed to go on year after year if it was in a more affluent place. Donegal is consistently left behind and consistently forgotten about. The people living with defective concrete blocks may not be rich or might not be politically connected, but by God they are bloody determined. We are going to stand with them and we are going to fight with them tooth and nail to make sure that they get the 100% redress they deserve. People need to be able to rebuild their homes and rebuild their lives. The Government should do the right thing. Every TD who has the right conscience should vote for this motion here today.

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