Compensation for mica contaminated blocks in houses.

You are missing the point


Your repeated use of this phrase is a little condescending. Just because an opinion is different to yours it doesn’t not mean that people misunderstand what you are trying to say.

I don’t miss your point at all. I don’t believe the state are liable for this. Admitting liability on this issue opens up a massive can of worms.

That does not mean those affected should not have help/compensation of some kind.
 
Your repeated use of this phrase is a little condescending. Just because an opinion is different to yours it doesn’t not mean that people misunderstand what you are trying to say.
I know they understand yet the focus is on attacking the victims rather than look for answers as to why the State is admitting liability.

the State knew enough in 1949 to limit mica to below 1% in the standards, this problem showed up in 2008 in council houses and started repairs, surely their engineers look at the crumbling blocks We don't know if they tested them and traced the problem blocks back to the source if we the taxpayers want to limit our future exposure this is the question that needs to be answered,
is most of the 3 billion or more due to the states failure to act when they knew there was a problem,
That does not mean those affected should not have help/compensation of some kind.
 
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What do you mean by 'local authority allowed self regulation'?

What legislation gives the local authorities a role in regulating quality of building products? What alternatives do they have to self-regulation?

Are you suggesting that the local authority should be testing every supplier of bricks, wood, insulation, cables, switches, pipes, taps that goes into every house build?
 
The regulations should be enforced. Whoever does it is not relevant.

Allowing the suppliers to self regulate with light touch auditing, is why it is where it is today.

The local authority in this instance knew well that the products were dodgy but continued to use them, despite it being public knowledge for over 13 years.
 
It's easy to say that 'the regulations should be enforced' but are you really suggesting that Government needs to be testing every supplier of bricks, wood, insulation, cables, switches, pipes, taps and much, much more that go into every house build? Do we need to be stopping lorries coming over the border to Donegal to look check for certification of building goods?

The primary responsibility here is with the purchaser of the property or the purchaser of the supplies.
 
And I suppose this is a fear in the government. If they admit lability here are they setting precedent for the state up to take responsibility for every fault going forward....

And if that is the case, if I am a supplier of anything in this country why would I bother trying to achieve any standard as well sure the Government will pick up the bill...
 
Seems they now want the full rebuild of their houses to be paid by the taxpayer.

A rebuild in today's standards would be substantially higher quality than many/all of these houses.

If the government is to pay then they should pay the value of the houses as they are (if they did not have mica) and not a rebuild to today's standards which is what the people behind the protests are now looking for. And those people most likely have a different agenda.
 
The primary responsibility here is with the purchaser of the property or the purchaser of the supplies.
So, in the current case, the homeowners purchased their house and got a certificate saying it was sound.
The suppliers of the blocks provided a certificate for their blocks. A certificate they printed and signed themselves, with a nsai logo in the corner.
The blocks look fine when out of the factory so a builder could never tell the difference.

So you are saying it's the purchasers responsibility?

If you buy a new car should you then take it straight to a garage to get it tested make sure it's ok, or put faith in the fact that the manufacturer is suitably monitored?

Have you actually done any research on this or just the scanty information in this forum?

Do you not believe the homeowners?
 
Completely agree with this. At a max this is what should happen.

I would be concerned that the State (by extention the tax payer) is on the hook for this.
 
If you buy a new car should you then take it straight to a garage to get it tested make sure it's ok, or put faith in the fact that the manufacturer is suitably monitored?
Legislation in Ireland offers much stronger protections for the purchase of a car or a toaster than the purchase of a house. Caveat emptor applies to the purchase of property and it is the purchaser's responsibility to satisfy themselves that all is in order. Of course that is difficult to achieve in practice, but that doesn't change the law.
 
If the supplier is legally obliged to test and certify a product and they did not do so or falsified their certification then those involved should be going to prison for decades. The State is liable, if not legally then morally and certainly politically. But the argument that we had/have 'light touch' regulation is not the issue. The issue is that we, the State, didn't enforce that regulation. Therefore the people who falsified the certification should be joined in prison by the State employees who were employed to enforce regulations but didn't bother doing their job.
The most galling thing about all of this is that, just like every other scandal involving the State, nobody will actually be held accountable or sanctioned. This required a catastrophic failure by State employees to do their job.
 
To the best of my knowledge, there was no certification required at this stage, before the changes in Building Control regs brought about after Priory Hall. At that stage, the BC regs existed, but there was no legal requirement for local authorities to inspect every site and certainly no requirement for local authorities to test every component. The target set by Government was for inspection of 12%-15% of sites, so no-one was working on the assumption that every site and every component was tested and certified.
 
One wonders what % of inspections were actually / in reality properly carried out by Donegal CC.
 
If reports on social media are belived then it seems the council knew about this as far back as 2009 so that is worrying as they dont seem to have done anything
 
so no-one was working on the assumption that every site and every component was tested and certified.
With the exception of some medical devices and a small number of components that go into aircraft engines no manufactured products are 100% tested and certified. I would expect batch testing on raw materials, batch testing on finished components (blocks and bricks) to a specific AQL, audits of the key suppliers in the supply chain, up to date certification (ISO standards etc) of those key suppliers, and a supplier quality management system in place for the main contractor who built the properties in question.

This is just another manifestation of the dysfunctionality of the construction sector and the incompetence and total inability to regulate of the State (not put rules in place but ensure they are followed).
 
One wonders what % of inspections were actually / in reality properly carried out by Donegal CC.
Dunno about Donegal, but I do recall from about 15 years back that Mayo had one building control officer, and he had at least one other role in the Council too. So that's one person responsible for inspecting every development, commercial and residential in Mayo, along with all the prep work, dealing with queries and complaints. You wouldn't have a hope of doing a high level of inspections, and for ones they did do, it would most likely be one or maybe two visits, which gives little opportunity for really getting to grips with what goes on at building sites.
If reports on social media are belived then it seems the council knew about this as far back as 2009 so that is worrying as they dont seem to have done anything
What would you have expected them to do? The Councils have very limited powers in regulating private building activity. When they do start enforcement proceedings, they'll be faced with injunctions and hearings and appeals and more.
 
What would you have expected them to do? The Councils have very limited powers in regulating private building activity. When they do start enforcement proceedings, they'll be faced with injunctions and hearings and appeals and more.
In this case, the council was the biggest customer of the main quarry in question, and still was up until summer 2021.
That's why every public building, houses, septic tanks, manhole structures, bridges, etc etc, built since the late 90s, are all wrapped up in this scandal.
Imagine trying to find and repair every single inspection chamber built in the NW of the country since the late 90s....

When the families who took a case we're told in 2014 that the supplier had no insurance, the council were still the biggest customer, before and after.
 
The Council would rarely buy raw materials like this directly. They would be contracting with a contractor to build a bridge or an office or sewage, and the contractor would make their own decisions around raw materials. So I'm not sure it is fair to say that the Council were the biggest customer. Is there any records to verify this? The only award notice I can find for concrete products for Donegal refers to a supplier based in Limerick: https://irl.eu-supply.com/ctm/Suppl...=ctm/Supplier/PublicTenders&b=ETENDERS_SIMPLE
 
thread about the Mica claims here: https://twitter.com/EDoherty_tweets/status/1445511064838234126

having read it, I still think not enough has been done to pursue those responsible for the faulty materials. It states in the thread that the suppliers didn't have the appropriate level of insurance - were they prosecuted? Were they sued anyway? They must have some assets, apparently they're still in business.