I thank Deputy Charles Ward for bringing forward this motion and for giving us the opportunity to co-sign it, which, as my colleague said, we were more than pleased to do. I have been dealing with the legacy of the Government’s soft touch or, indeed, non-existent regulation since I was elected. The core point here, and this is the thing that is very often lost, most especially on Fianna Fáil Ministers but also on the Government in general, is that my constituents in north County Dublin did absolutely nothing wrong. They bought their homes. They made what is the biggest investment of their lives in good faith. They are not engineers. When the builder told them that the house was up to scratch, they expected that it was going to be up to scratch. For decades, thousands of them have endured their homes crumbling. Can you imagine the trauma of not feeling safe in your home? It is the one place where you should have a right to feel safe and secure. While the lads who were in the Galway tent will sail away off into the sunset, happy, rich and benefiting from the sale of those homes, the people they left behind will deal with the trauma for generations. Homeowners in Lusk are now being told they will have to pay for another test to get a green certificate, when they were told back in 2013 that they had to wait three years and would then get their green certificate. They are not getting it now. They have to get another test that is, potentially, going to cost them €2,500. This is never-ending. These people have been dealing with this situation now for 20 years. They bought their homes in 2003 and, within a couple of years, those houses started to crumble. The problem is never going to end unless the Government is prepared to deal with it. Likewise, Fingal was only admitted to the new scheme this year and already people are being told that this scheme is not fit for purpose. I ask the Minister of State to please withdraw the Government’s obnoxious amendment and listen to the people, and their representatives, who are dealing with this issue. I also ask him to acknowledge the role of his party, the Galway tent, its cosy relationship with developers and all that has happened, and to have the decency to say sorry to people and to make proper amends. A 100% redress scheme should mean 100%.

Sentiment score: 0.11