Victor Boyhan
Agricultural Panel · Independent · Ireland
“It also mentions the agrifood sector and the importance of diversification in agriculture, the maritime sector, coastal communities and fishing communities in terms of rural policy.”
“I know from my engagement with both the Department and the Minister that over 900 submissions to the consultation process were received. No Member or parliamentarian will have had the opportunity to consider the anonymised version of these consultations, which contain many good suggestions in favour of the regulations and many concerns in…”
“I welcome the Minister and the official to the Seanad. This is particularly important Private Members' business. I thank Senators Collins and Tully for setting out the background and the rationale behind their Private Members' motion. I acknowledge the Minister's exceptional commitment to rural Ireland and his Ministry.”
“I am conscious of the Minister's public consultation, and I acknowledge it and thank them for it, in relation to the Our Rural Future work programme in 2025. In fairness to him, he did not stop at that. I received a further update when I requested it from his office very recently.”
“This will come about through that process. It is for the Minister to decide. Maybe he will do so tomorrow when the regulations are dealt with. However, when Senators are in this Chamber discussing these regulations tomorrow, they will have no sight of any constituent who made a submission. That is my first item.”
“I am pleased to see Senator Byrne in the Leader’s chair. I wish him well in that job. I also wish him well in his new position as Government Whip. There are three items I wish to discuss today. First is the exempt development regulations, which are being covered extensively in the media.”
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“I thank the Minister of State for her very sympathetic response, as always. We greatly appreciate her coming to the House to deal with this matter today. I thank Senator Clonan for raising this matter. It is a very important one. I would like to welcome and thank Patricia. I recognised her the minute I saw her there because we came across each other somewhere else before. Patricia and her son Bryan are very welcome to these Houses. It is a reminder when people come with their lived experience and see this Parliament work in the way it does. It makes it very real and very live and that is particularly so for Patricia and Bryan. I thank them for giving their time, sharing their story and their experience because that helps to make this place – and hopefully, in the long run, this world – a better place.”
“What better person than the Comptroller and Auditor General and what better entity than the Department of Finance, both of which are stitched into this proposal? The report can be laid before both Houses of the Oireachtas for scrutiny, if deemed necessary as a result of their comments or recommendations.”
“This is a very simple request and it makes absolute sense. It is about confidence in the governance of these structures that are under the Minister's remit. I hope the Minister will be in a position to support this amendment. It is worthy and makes absolute sense. If we are to learn anything from past experience in the training sector in particular, but also in the education sector, it is better to be sure and to put these controls and governance measures in place. I commend this amendment and thank Senator Tully and her colleagues in Sinn Féin for tabling it. I urge the Minister to accept it but, ultimately, that is a matter for him. It makes absolute sense and would send a very clear message.”
“I do not intend to go into that now but the Minister will be familiar with some of them. Anything that brings additionality and safeguarding to corporate governance is really important. I support amendment No. 1 moved by Senator Tully, which seeks to ensure that: Accounts of the Fund shall be prepared on an annual basis, in such form and ... in such manner as the Minister for Finance may direct, and the Comptroller and Auditor General shall examine, evaluate and certify every such account and a copy thereof, together with the report thereon of the Comptroller and Auditor General, shall be laid by the Minister before each House of the Oireachtas. I could not argue with any of that and do not think the Minister would either. It is better to be safer and surer and to have additional measures in place.”
“I welcome the Minister to the House. I support the National Training Fund (Amendment) Bill, which makes absolute sense. It is a short, concise Bill and we all know what it is about. I support the additionality of what Senator Tully is proposing, which also makes absolute sense. I do not see any issue with it. I happen to sit on the Joint Oireachtas audit committee. I have also sat on a number of State audit committees and am particularly interested in the corporate governance of our public expenses. It is very important that we have full accountability and transparency. We have had issues in the training sector and in the education sector in particular. There have been concerns regarding governance in the former vocational education committees, VECs, now the education and training boards, ETBs.”
“We have to work more constructively to tackle issues and put a timeframe in place. I wish everyone a good and happy Christmas and new year.”
“Over the past few weeks I have taken the time to look at all the Commencement matters from the past 12 months and many of the contributions under the Order of Business. There are really three recurring themes, which are health, housing and mental health. It might be no harm at some stage to look at that because people come in time and again, particularly from the Government side, with concerns about leaking roofs, lack of classroom places, school transport and many such things. They have constituents, too, or they have other interests. If we are going to use our time wisely, we need to look at that and see how we can address it. We have Government Senators talking to Government Ministers about such issues and there does not seem to be any resolution. I will leave it at that.”
“While we might have robust engagement, we leave here at the end of the day to move on to the next task. That is the task of politics. We have to be pragmatic, we have to push on and we have to be able to do business with other people at different times. At our level of engagement it is always important we have a good, healthy and robust debate but we also have a relationship that allows us to progress legislation and move on with other people. I thank the Cathaoirleach, particularly for his initiative that we will have today - the beginning of the Seanad Select Committee on EU Scrutiny and Transparency. That is a very important measure the Cathaoirleach has introduced and I look forward to engaging with the committee later.”
“It has been a huge learning curve for many of us. Some people are new here. It has been a particularly exciting year. Many of us have been elected and some have been appointed by the Taoiseach and it is always a great privilege, whatever strand one comes into the Seanad from. I thank Mr. Martin Hughes, our now Clerk of the Seanad. He has excelled in his position. He has a lot of experience in this House anyway. I also thank Ms Aileen Fallon, our Clerk Assistant, and all the staff of the Seanad Office. I thank Ms Orla Murray, who is instrumentally involved in the Leader's office, and I thank the Leader for the way we have operated these Houses. It is not always easy but we are always mindful that we have to be respectful of one another and our positions.”
“First, I welcome the students to the Chamber. It is great to see young people actively working and engaging in our processes of parliamentary democracy. As this will be my last contribution on the Order of Business this side of 2026 because I will only be here for a short time tomorrow, I will take this opportunity to thank a few people. I thank my colleagues across both Houses. We come from a different perspective in the Opposition. It is more difficult, of course, and we have to scrutinise the legislation. The Government side has the legislation and effectively their hands are tied. There is very little movement in terms of amendments. They do have amendments but not the same number of them because they are collectively Members on the Government side. That should not come as a surprise to any Member on the Government side of the Seanad.”
“The position is always changing. In an ideal world, there would be nobody affected but we do not live in an ideal world. There are always challenges. One never knows what is coming down the road at any of us within weeks or months. That is an important point. I was hoping we could come to some arrangement and set out the ambition in legislation that no child would be in a public or a private service with adults. I do not draw a distinction between public or private once the service is doing what is meant to be doing and there are proper governance controls in place, which I suggest there are. In an ideal world, we do not want any children in psychiatric services, particularly residential psychiatric services, with adults. It is not appropriate. Best practice tells us it is not good. Advocates say it is not good.”
“They are very broad, both in the day patient sector and the private sector. Therefore, we are not comparing like with like. All these services have to be subject to probity, and I am not suggesting they are not. This is primary legislation for mental health and all of them are subject to it. The situation is an evolving one and, as the Minister of State said, her figures are for up to October. We do not know what will happen next year. There are a lot of challenging issues. We see in our schools that guidance counsellors have a lot of young people presenting with very serious, complex mental health issues that need a variety of interventions. We have to be very careful about bandying around numbers. Across the board, in the public and private sector, we do not actually have the statistics today on the number of people involved.”
“That clarification from the Minister of State is very interesting. It is the first time in this debate we have had this differentiation made between the public and private sector. We need to see that in the context of these numbers. I told the Minister of State I had figures that I did not feel it would be responsible of me to share here until there was further validation of them. They are, however, far higher than two. However, it is helpful that the Minister of State has differentiated between the private and public sector. This is a national policy in a new Bill on mental health. All services are subject to inspection. There are many beds in the private psychiatric services. I am familiar with two or three facilities just in Dublin that have huge capacity. They do a really good job and work very closely with the State.”
“We will have another opportunity to deal with that. The Minister of State also put on the record - and I want to be clear in order to be fair to her - that there two persons under 18 were placed in adult psychiatric care-----”
“Now that the Minister of State has encouraged me, I am going to comment further. She stated that she is not prepared to legislate for any children in adult psychiatric services. I do not want children to be placed in such services. Will the Minister legislate to ensure that it will not happen? She should show me the legislation or tell me when, following the passage of this Bill and having had time to reflect, she is going to legislate. I am happy to support any proposal from the Minister of State, or anyone else for that matter, which categorically states that no child will be placed in a psychiatric setting with adults in order to receive care or support. That is what I would really like, if possible. The Minister of State is committed to that, but can we see it in some form of amendment? The Minister of State is saying "No".”
“If there is clarification required, I will be more than happy to come in and provide it next week. Let us be clear of the facts. I ask the Minister of State to look at the printout also. I do not know the point she is making, but she is happy enough. I am happy to give her an assurance that I will look at this in the context in which I have spoken about it and in the context of the definition. Let us not lose sight of or deflect from the real problem.”
“I am delighted the Minister of State has brought this up, and I certainly commit to looking into it. I will not say it now. I will not make it up while I am on my feet. I served on the board of St. Patrick's University Hospital where children were detained and where the courts incarcerated children aged 16 and 17 and also those aged 15. I am also very familiar with the Prison Service from my work with it. I was appointed by a Minister to both institutions. I am very familiar with the word "incarcerated". In the context of incarcerated to psychiatric hospitals, I did not say that. I said children were incarcerated in care. I am very happy to give the Minister of State the absolute commitment - and I thank her for bringing this to my attention - that this afternoon I will look at the of everything that has been said here.”
“I am glad to have the opportunity to flag my general concern and that of many people outside of this House who are watching these proceedings. My concern is the issue of vulnerable people who are children, although they have special status in terms of being 16 or 17 years of age in relation to medical aspects. There is that deep concern and I share that concern.”
“We will have other opportunities through this legislation to talk about it. The Minister of State talks about challenges and putting kids at risk. I do not want anyone to be at risk. However, it has to be the collective ambition across government that no child would be in care in an adult unit. I am not in a position to share this information yet but I will be in the new year. I have tried to quantify the number of children in certain mental health establishments and their age profile in the past 12 months. I am hearing different reports from people who provide the services on the ground. It would not be responsible or right for me to bandy around figures until I have hard facts. I am happy to share them here with the Seanad. More than likely, this amendment would never have been accepted anyway.”
“Hopefully, it will be successful. I have no doubt it will be passed by both Houses. I appreciate the engagement of the Minister of State and her staff with us on each section of it. The really important aspect of this is that these are 16- and 17-year-olds, sometimes even younger. If we talk to any international UN advocacy groups or human rights groups, there are major concerns on this. It is about ambition. We need to put targets in place. We need to say categorically that no child will be incarcerated at any stage. That is challenging and there are difficulties but that has to be our collective ambition. I am looking forward to the new year when I will engage with the Ombudsman's office and a number of advocacy groups. I indicated last week that that is what I intend to do. I have reached out to some of them already.”
“Following this emergency 72-hour timeframe, that care and treatment must be provided. That is my concern and the concern of many professional advocates who engage with the Minister. That is really important. The kernel of it is the children in our State, whom we have an obligation to protect under a special provision in our Constitution. There are issues about the welfare of a child and where the child is placed, whether that is in care or in family circumstances. There are many different circumstances and many of these people whom I call children, in this category of 16- and 17-year-olds, are on our streets in Dublin. They slept out last night. They have mental health issues. They have a complexity of issues. It is about ambition. After all, this is going to be the Minister of State's new Bill that she has initiated and driven through.”
“I thank the Cathaoirleach for clarifying that. It is rarely used and rarely asked for but that clarity and the Cathaoirleach reading that into the record is something we should exercise more often because these records stand. I accept that these are the Standing Orders we have all signed up to. We can amend our Standing Orders, of course, though it would be very difficult, given the huge majority on the other side of the House. However, I operate within the rules. That is a rule as well. Now it is on the record. That brings me to discussion of section 10. I will touch on the issues in relation to the amendment I tabled. It has been ruled out of order so I will talk about it in broad brush strokes. The key concern is that under no circumstances should a child be placed in an adult unit for longer than 72 hours.”
“Under the processes, when we finish whatever section we will finish today, it will be open to us to submit other amendments. They were important amendments and I want to put that on the record. I ask the Cathaoirleach to read into the record the reasons set out in the note supplied to him in relation to the amendments.”
“It begs the question of what are we doing here at all, if everything has an implication on cost. I want to flag those amendments. I circulated those amendments to many advocacy groups. I explained and circulated the letter that was provided to me. However, it is important that people understand because we look back on these proceedings and the printouts, and it is important we understand it is not a failure on our part to advocate. It is a system that we have to operate within. I accept that but it is disappointing that these amendments were ruled out of order. There are other imaginative ways to address this and I have asked for the wording of these amendments to be recalibrated into other sections of this Bill which will be coming down the track.”
“I want to touch on them. This is part of the section and they fall within that section. A note was provided to the Cathaoirleach in relation to those. I ask that they be read into the record again because we will have another opportunity for amendments on the next Stage of this Bill when we come back. However, section 39 was a guiding principle to apply in respect of children. I sought to delete the clause "in so far as is practicable". Children who are not in State care are very vulnerable and it touched on that. I asked to have that taken out but I was told there would be a cost to the Exchequer arising from that. We might as well render ourselves redundant and useless in here if everything we speak about is subject to that constraint, but I will talk about that later. My other amendment was also ruled out of order.”
“Mental health and the disability sector are huge in that top cohort of concerns for people. My appeal here today, in the broader appeal to the audience outside of this Chamber who are listening in and who are an important audience to our parliamentary processes and debates, is that we crank up the initiative and bring to bear some pressure on the Government so that these two conventions can be ratified. I am not expecting the Minister of State to reply. I merely want to share that with her because it is important. I really want to see ambition in this area so that we can align these with the Minister of State's legislation and with other legislation, as I know it goes over a wide field. The decision was taken to rule out amendments Nos. 39 and 40 in my name. I have to accept that. There are rules that guide our parliamentary processes.”
“We see people going out there and strongly advocating for these two important conventions to be transposed into domestic law. I do not know what we are doing, quite frankly, that we have not done it. I did an analysis of a lot of Commencement matters here and business taken under the Order of Business, and the three issues that come up most are housing, hospitals and healthcare, and disability. From all sides of the House, they are the same issues. Some Senators might perhaps forget that they are in government, but there are the same issues about water leaking into schools, no school extensions, and problems in Limerick and lots of other hospitals. I am not singling out Limerick for the sake of my colleague here, Senator Maria Byrne, because she is a great advocate for Limerick and Limerick hospital, but they are the same issues.”
“The Government could initiate this, but it will just have to come down to us here, with Commencement matters and motions, keeping the pressure on the Government to live up to its commitment. The State is a signatory, after all, to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. In the last few days, I have constantly taken calls from people saying that they are not happy. They do not see the comforts that the Minister of State talks about. They are coming from a particular focus of their own experience. I think we need to be ambitious. I appeal to the Minister of State, who has vast experience in this area. This overlaps much of the Minister of State's work in her Ministry.”
“I will not go into great length because, in fairness, the Minister of State was very patient and we had a good debate. I certainly received a lot of feedback from the debate. People are not particularly happy. I suppose the word that we perhaps did not hear enough of was the "ambition" of the Government. The Minister of State explained to us all that, of course, it was an all-of-Government approach to the two UN conventions but it is important that we send out a clear message. I cannot put words into the Minister of State's mouth but we on this side of the House are ambitious to see it done. Clearly, that has to be a priority or we have to make it be a priority. We have to continue to get TDs to ask parliamentary questions - predominantly those in opposition because they are the Opposition.”
“We must always be conscious of that challenge and keep a keen eye on it. We need to constantly assess it. I drafted a parliamentary question for a Member of the Dáil to submit, which I think will be done in January. It seeks the costs involved every month for the last 12 months. While it is hard to so, somewhere along the line, we have to assess the outcomes, not in terms of value for money but in terms of the human experience and how it has graduated or assisted in the rehabilitation or support of the individual.”
“That is great. It is important to note, however, that we still send people outside the State in exceptional or very challenging circumstances. That is not an ideal situation and we need to monitor it. That has to be a priority for us. We talk about children’s advocacy, children’s rights and the UN convention. This is an issue of concern to the advocacy groups. It has to be an issue of concern to Tusla. It says it does not necessarily have the resources or the specialties to deal with it. This applies particularly to children who may have already been committed to some sort of care order or institutional care and even that placement becomes very difficult and the system cannot cope. That is a challenge, more so when the parents do not see themselves as a stakeholder or do not wish to be a stakeholder in that collaborative rehabilitation.”
“A relative of mine is 99 years old and is still going strong, with loads of capacity, so I am hopeful for myself. Let us not lose sight of the elderly in the psychogeriatric area because they are also important in terms of this legislation.”
“The Minister of State spoke about young people. Another group who are important, and this is also part of her brief, is the elderly. There are a lot of people in the psychogeriatric category. From speaking to people in psychiatric services in Dublin, I know in some cases it is difficult to get engagement with any member of the family. That is the reality. Family members come in, the patient is deposited and no one seems to get back. This is a challenge for the services. It does not happen too often but it does happen. It is important we do not lose sight of that. I know the Minister of State has not lost sight of it. She is fiercely committed to this part of her brief but there are a lot of people in care without capacity or it is presumed they do not have capacity. A lot of elderly people have capacity.”
“That will obviously be an evolving process once the Bill is commenced. That is welcome. As we are not going to get through more than two or three sections today, it would be helpful to have a note on that. Again, it will mostly be on the record and we can read it again. That is the sort of clarity people are looking for. The Children’s Rights Alliance and different advocate groups have already been in touch with us. If I was to read out all the emails I have received since we met last week, we would be here all day. I am not sure if they are all correct and I would not read them into the record. People have different agendas, backgrounds and experiences, which is why they come from different positions. We have to see through many lenses. That is the challenge for us all. I welcome the clarity the Minister of State has brought to this.”
“I will just say that people are more vulnerable if they are sent out of the State to be cared for. This does not happen too often, but it does happen. There are reasons for it. I am not sure if it is a good reason in terms of a lack of facilities within our services, but hopefully that will change. That is important. There is the issue regarding guardianship and the level of commitment of a guardian. Not all guardians are willing ones. Circumstances put people into these roles. It could be a member of an extended family who becomes a guardian. People have legal responsibilities if they take guardianship on. I welcome that the Minister of State spoke about the guiding principles and indicated that they are going to be worked out at some point. I also welcome her comments on safeguards, which are important, and codes of practice.”
“I know enough about it, as does the Minister of State. There has been a lot of concern about people in the care of Tusla. The agency has got it wrong many times, but it has also got it right many times. I am not here to knock it. Tusla deals with vulnerable people, as does our Prison Service. Many of these people are very challenging. The best of us are challenging, but some people who have added complexities and difficulties are exceptionally challenging. The establishment does not like people who challenge it. It is too easy to write people off and say that they have mental health issues or complications and that we are washing our hands of them. We know people have gone from this State into other jurisdictions to be cared for. That is just the reality of that situation. I do not want to open all that up.”
“As the Minister of State knows from her office and from correspondence received and as we know from emails and correspondence we have received, this matter has very much exercised the minds of people, and rightly so. There are vulnerable people in every cohort. In this particular cohort, if we were to talk to people involved in advocating for youth workers, the homeless or Tusla - I am going to come back to that organisation in a moment - there are huge concerns about vulnerable people and what is in their best interests. As the Minister of State has confirmed again this morning, the term "due weight" is being taken out. That is important. When there is a weighting system, it is about which way the scales tip. It depends on whether a parent, a guardian or Tusla is involved. I have been highly critical of Tusla.”
“I thank the Minister of State for the early start this morning. We do not normally come in as early as this, so I thank her and her officials. I, too, wish her a good Christmas. We will not be dealing with the Bill again this week. We had originally planned to do so tomorrow. I put that on the record and thank the Minister of State's officials. It is very intense work because every "t" needs to be crossed and every "i" dotted. I accept that. What the Minister of State read into the record - and, of course, we will see the report later today - brings greater clarity. One of the biggest issues, as I said earlier, is the concern about the 16- and 17-year-olds.”
“We also saw the shift in the dynamic of the main political parties, particularly in Donegal but also in Mayo and other places. I am not going to labour the point because the people who know about it are clued in. They have the lived experience. It is really important and I support what Senator Black is trying to do.”
“I am not going to spend time on it because I know the Minister is under pressure - we are under pressure too; we have a lot of business to do and there are many things on the political agenda for a lot of people here tonight - but at the end of the day people set out to do the noble thing, that is, to provide themselves with a home, to go into debt to build a home or pay a developer, builder or construction company to build a home, and those people now find that part or all of their home is crumbling. We have to step in because it would not have happened if we had proper regulation in place. Anything less than that is unfair. We saw the political consequences of it. We saw the shift of support to different political groupings, including the four 100% Redress councillors and the one 100% Redress TD.”
“I fully support Senator Black and her work on all of these amendments. At the end of the day, we are very familiar with the term 100% redress. That is what people are entitled to. This defective concrete block system results from the light-touch regulation of successive Governments going back a long time. Innocent people who set out to realise their ambition to provide a home for themselves in the county they love and want to work and live in have found themselves in this situation. I cannot support anything that dilutes or waters down 100% redress to people who should be entitled to it. It is as simple as that.”
“They are falling asunder for the lack of people. We have a serious issue if we want to protect the viability of our rural communities. I ask the Leader to organise a meeting in the new year where we could look at this again. Let us pull out all the letters, stop the promises and produce sustainable rural housing guidelines that are fit for purpose to meet the needs and demands of the people in rural communities today.”
“I hear Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil TDs, Senators and councillors all around the country, particularly at rural and farming gatherings, talking about the shame of this because they represent communities where people cannot get housing. Yet, somehow, all of this is stalled in that process. One has to ask what is going on on a Wednesday evening at the parliamentary parties. Are people listening to their membership? I am not a member of any of them. I have asked the Leader on numerous occasions for a specific meeting on housing, but especially on the ability of people to plan for proper, sustainable housing. I am not talking about housing everywhere. However, there are communities in this country that are dying on their feet. One need only talk to the GAA, parish schools or parishes and communities.”
“I also welcome the Government's additional measures in relation to the living over the shop grants, on which there was some clarification today. I think it makes sense. Many of our urban and rural towns and villages are falling apart. It is a shame, in particular as many of them are of architectural significance. Of course, there are great benefits to that. I welcome the measures. I also want to touch on the issue of rural housing. We have had the rural housing guidelines since 2005. It is now 2025, and it is unbelievable that they have never been amended. I have letters in my office from six Ministers who told me that this was in draft form, sitting on their desk, waiting to be tidied up, with a few i’s to be dotted and t’s crossed. We are still here, all of these years on, and we have no guidelines.”
“We would not be in this situation if we had proper controls and systems to prevent what has happened. I urge the Minister to communicate well and to engage in a meaningful way on the amendments. I believe we can progress this legislation. There is a pathway here, through what the Minister has set out in this Bill, to remedy the situation and give confidence. It is going to be slow, costly and challenging but together we can make a difference for the people who live there.”
“If the Minister is reasonable and fair and comes halfway to addressing some of these amendments, we will progress this Bill. I do not doubt the commitment of the Minister or his officials to the Bill, but I urge him to please use the time to communicate well the progress. That is what people want. It gives us hope when we go there and see houses being built and people moving into homes. I have been there. I have walked around the place and met with people. I have sat with them and listened to their stories. They are deeply frustrated and hurt and they do not have a bob in their pocket to put it right. They expect the State to step in. We must remember that it was light-touch regulation or no regulation that allowed this situation to happen.”
“In recent years, there have been difficulties for politicians on all sides on this matter. People are frustrated, disappointed and angry. They have seen their homes crumble with no hope of fixing them. It is a very difficult situation for everyone involved. We need to progress this legislation. I hope the Minister will respond in a fair manner to amendments because it does not augur well for this Government or the previous one that most amendments that come to this House on any matter are rejected. We have seen in the past three weeks that most Ministers come into this House, read bits of paper, thank us for our contributions and say they are sorry that they cannot deal with the issue in question. That is not a respectful way to deal with the Upper House.”
“The Minister is proposing a good suite of measures in the Bill. I am not going to rush in here with a load of meaningless amendments that are not going to get us far. What we need to do now is progress these key objectives. It is very important that we progress what the Minister is setting out in this Bill and that we talk in the coming days. I looked at the debate in the Dáil and saw where it went. At the end of the day, the people who are expected to live in these circumstances need support and redress. I support the direction of this Bill. What we need to focus on is the timing of all of this. The message I will leave with the Minister is that we need communication. Where there is a void or an absence of accurate information, discontent arises. It is a very difficult situation. There are communities pitched against communities.”
“We know and acknowledge the significance of this Bill, the purpose of which is: to amend the eligibility criteria for applications for grants in respect of alternative accommodation…to provide for a further mechanism for the assessment of certain attached dwellings damaged by the use of defective concrete blocks [I acknowledge that this is all clearly set out in the Bill]; to provide for an application for an increase in the amount of a grant for remediation of certain dwellings damaged by the use of defective concrete blocks; to amend the time limit for the payment of a grant for remediation; to provide for the construction of a new dwelling in exceptional circumstances; to provide for the review of certain approved remediation options and a procedure for the approval of a new remediation option and grant; to enable certain joint owners to become relevant owners; to provide for charging orders for additional payments and their release; to provide for information sharing between specified public bodies; to amend and extend the Building Control Act 1990 to provide for regularisation certificates of compliance on completion in certain circumstances ...”
“These are all extracts from contributions and media comment. There are demands that the Government, its agencies and local authorities provide suitable temporary accommodation as a matter of urgency; promote and continue scientific research into the cause of the defective blocks; and require local authorities to publish monthly statistics on the status of applications, the number of properties remediated, the grants, the moneys outstanding and the time taken to get on with the inquiries. That is the scenario. I do not think any of us need a lecture on that. We all understand that across these Houses. I acknowledge the importance of the Bill. I want to work with the Minister, as I know many Members of this House want to do.”