Written answers
Wednesday, 28 April 2021
Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government
Defective Building Materials
Violet-Anne Wynne (Clare, Sinn Fein)
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475. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government if he will carry out an urgent review of the financial assistance that will be required by the State to include County Clare under the defective concrete blocks grant scheme; and if he will include properties in the information received to date from Clare County Council and the serious concerns of affected families residing in these properties across the county. [21689/21]
Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Fianna Fail)
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My Department received correspondence from Clare County Council in October 2020, requesting the extension of the Defective Concrete Blocks Grant to County Clare. A comprehensive reply was subsequently issued to the Council in November 2020.
My Department informed the Council that before any extension of the scheme can be considered the same rigorous analysis as that put in place prior to the rollout of the scheme to the counties of Donegal and Mayo would have to be undertaken. Following further discussions between my Department and Clare County Council it was agreed that the local authority would take a lead role in determining, in accordance with the IS: 465 protocol, that issues arising in homes in County Clare are in fact due to the presence of excessive amounts of deleterious materials (mica or pyrite) in the aggregate used to manufacture the concrete blocks and secondly quantify the likely extent of the problem in the county.
Such analysis will provide the evidential basis necessary for the consideration of any extension of the scheme. Pending the receipt of such analysis it would be premature to consider an extension of the scheme.
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