Green Party motion on Building Standards, Regulation and Homeowner Protection to be debated in the Dáil today
Green Party Deputy Leader Catherine Martin TD has described today’s fire safety evacuations from apartments in Mountjoy Square as another wake-up call for the Government to get serious about building regulation.
Twenty people, including children, are to be evacuated from the potentially unsafe building following a High Court hearing yesterday.
Speaking today, Deputy Martin said: “A week on from the terrible tragedy at Grenfell Tower in London, evacuations due to fire safety concerns are happening to residents in Mountjoy Square in Dublin. This is another wake-up call for the Government. They must get serious about building regulation and ensuring that acceptable standards are met.
“We welcome the move by the new Minister for Housing, Eoghan Murphy, to review fire safety standards in multi-storey social housing units, but more must be done. There are tens of thousands of homes out there falling short of the required standards – whether that’s in relation to pyrite, mika, water ingress, or fire safety issues. I have been contacted by constituents facing bills of almost €40,000 to put right failures thanks to a lack of enforcement of building standards. We have to ensure that we put a stop to these failures. We must put an end to self-certification.”
Green Party Senator Grace O’Sullivan, a member of the Oireachtas Housing and Planning Committee, said: “Without the credible threat of enforcement of building standards, they are not worth the paper they’re written on. Under the Government’s plans for updating the regulatory regime, there will be widespread exemptions from minimum standards. We must learn lessons, and put in place properly funded, independent building regulation. We’re calling for all groups in the Dáil to support our motion today. I will be raising this issue at the Oireachtas Housing and Planning Committee, regardless.”
