I support the inclusion of Fingal and Wexford in the defective concrete scheme. This motion exposes how the scheme is being delivered on the ground. Delivery is still happening in stages. Counties and areas are added one by one, often after long preparatory work has already been completed. This creates delay that is built into the system rather than delay caused by chance. The delay is shown in how slowly the scheme becomes available and how we are separating the tendering and designation processes for each county. The gap has not been occasional. It has been consistent throughout this whole scheme. I am not speaking from distance. My home is within the scheme, and I have been caught in the scheme for six years. Freedom of information material has come to light which shows that there is a very clear framework for chartered engineers who were not just planning the theory but were also actively being put in place for multiple counties from 2024 to 2025. This is significant because it shows that preparation is happening in advance. However, there is significant delay before preparation is turned into delivery. As the system prepares to deliver, families wait for years and the preparation translates into action on the ground, but the gap is now defining and the scheme is experiencing significant delays. As the Minister is aware, the pyrite remediation scheme provided true 100% redress. This scheme does not. The financial pressures emerging within the scheme are clear. The gap is already leading to shortfalls in County Donegal. That is happening now; it is not something that might happen in the future. These pressures will not stay in one area and they are likely to become very significantly troublesome in the areas of Fingal. This is what the current experience in Donegal is showing us. There are practical barriers within the scheme that affect whether homes can be built, even after approval. People are dealing with sequences of work, managing multiple-stage construction and coming to terms with how to fund the works upfront even before they begin, and their shortfalls are significant. Approval does not always mean progress on the ground. Only a few hundred homes have been fully completed under the scheme so far and some of those are remediation works. The scheme will run until 2037. At the current pace of delivery, that date does not reassure families. It shows how slowly homes are actually being completed. As more areas are added, the pattern becomes clearer. This is not because the problem is new but because the system has not changed. What exists is a process that prepares and pauses and then releases in stages rather than a system that moves smoothly, with readiness, to completion. The issue is not whether Fingal and Wexford should be included; of course they should be included. The issue is why inclusion requires repeated administrative steps when the groundwork for delivery has already been done. In that context, the actual work has to be done. There is no reason for families to be kept waiting. At this point, the real issue is not eligibility; it is the distance between preparation and completion. The suggestion has been made that those of us with concerns are afraid to enter the scheme. People are waiting. There has been no review of IS 465, and there is apprehension. People who are going into the scheme are out thousands and thousands of euro. People are not raising the issue for political advantage; they are raising it because they are dealing with this in their own counties along with their family and their friends. Families in damaged homes do not need their motives questioned. They need systems to function properly. They want a scheme that works. That is why I will continue to raise this matter, to challenge and to push to ensure that this is delivered at the pace and scale required. This is not about disagreement within the scheme. This is about whether it will deliver for families, and when will it be rolled out and whether that will happen in stages. There is real apprehension out there with regard to what is happening. We have 3,000 people caught in a scheme, and 300-plus houses completed and 300 more to come. At the rate we are going, it will take decades to rebuild the 3,000 houses. The real number of homes involved in Donegal is, at a bare minimum, between 10,000 and 20,000, because we know the potential for this is there on foot of all the affected materials that came from a certain quarry. The damage threshold might not come through yet, but people are living in houses with plastered up walls that only contain sand. There are no blocks there any more. The reality is that to this day there is no proper testing of quarries. As we speak, there are defective materials coming onto the market. When we should have scientific laboratories taking samples from every quarry in Donegal and measuring them to make sure that this does not happen again, nothing is happening. The approach to this appears to be "Close your eyes and let us hope things get better". This is not the fault of the homeowners. The homeowners have done nothing wrong. Anybody in Ireland who is affected by defective concrete has gone through a journey that you would not wish on anybody. This has been going on 14 years. We have two failed schemes. We are in the middle of a scheme right now under which work on barely 300 houses has been completed. A number of those were the subject of remediation work, which is a patch-up job. The work on these houses will have to be done again. Right now, people are stuck in them. They cannot sell their houses. They cannot move on with their lives. They are stuck in the same way that I am stuck and that everybody else involved is stuck. We are depending on the Minister to make sure that this scheme, that is coming following the review of IS 465, is done in the proper way. To give him figures in respect of the scheme, I hear from Micheál Martin every time I ask about this that we are spending €250 million. I understand all that, but I also understand that there are tens of thousands of houses to be built. At the current rate, it will take generations to complete the work. We have to accept that it was Government regulation and quarries that caused this. The latter produced materials that were defective and that were put into blocks that were sold on the market. We need the Minister to acknowledge that, and we need him to put proper protocols and testing in place to make sure this never happens again.

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