Results 921-940 of 1,981 for speaker:Richard O'Donoghue

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Inflationary Costs in the Construction Industry: Discussion (28 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: That is no problem at all. Ms Donaghy said that Home Building Finance Ireland, HBFI, needs to be publicised more and there needs to be more engagement in it. I would be happy to look at that on behalf of people who approach me for housing and who went to local authorities who have said that they are not interested in the area. I would be interested in getting contact details for that....

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Inflationary Costs in the Construction Industry: Discussion (28 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: Yes, I understand that.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Inflationary Costs in the Construction Industry: Discussion (28 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: It would help us, because many people are coming to us at the moment. We were talking about it with the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, in the Dáil last week. He said that never had as many applications gone through planning as have done so in the past 12 months. He is actually right but not even a quarter of them will be built. That is my...

Written Answers — Department of Public Expenditure and Reform: Covid-19 Pandemic (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: 198. To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform if discussions are expected in relation to the special leave for healthcare workers with long-Covid which they contracted through their work in a healthcare setting to be extended beyond the end of June 2022 given that many have the additional expense of travelling to Dublin for the necessary care; and if he will make a statement on...

Written Answers — Department of Health: Nursing Homes (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: 430. To ask the Minister for Health if discussions are expected to address the impact of the extraordinary inflationary costs upon private and voluntary nursing homes; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [33414/22]

Written Answers — Department of Health: Hospital Waiting Lists (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: 431. To ask the Minister for Health his views on whether persons in the mid-west who need neurology services should have to wait for a number of years for this service to be developed and the number of nurses increased as indicated by the CEO of University Hospital Limerick; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [33415/22]

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Remediation of Dwellings Damaged by the Use of Defective Concrete Blocks Bill 2022: Discussion (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: I am an Independent Deputy for Limerick. My colleague in Dublin, Senator Boyhan, and I are together in this. I am a building contractor and a blocklayer. I understand everything the witnesses are saying, but I will tell them why the core testing has to go ahead. The Government is now pushing a retrofit grant that is going out throughout the country. The grant is to insulate one's house....

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Remediation of Dwellings Damaged by the Use of Defective Concrete Blocks Bill 2022: Discussion (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: I am sorry to cut across Ms Murphy. There are a lot of houses in Limerick on which people have done remedial work because they had cracking. They have removed the plasterwork, put mesh onto those areas and got products that soak in to make the blocks harder. The problem now, however, is that when the winter comes again, the moisture will build up inside that and the whole lot will come off...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Remediation of Dwellings Damaged by the Use of Defective Concrete Blocks Bill 2022: Discussion (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: Yes. My first question is for Mr. Houton on costings. Are all of the costings that Mr. Houton gave plus VAT?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Remediation of Dwellings Damaged by the Use of Defective Concrete Blocks Bill 2022: Discussion (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: When dealing with quantity surveyors it is all plus VAT. In a 2,000 sq. ft house-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Remediation of Dwellings Damaged by the Use of Defective Concrete Blocks Bill 2022: Discussion (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: I am basing the costs in our area at roughly around €180 per sq. ft. That is the cost, roughly, to build a house. So, a 2,000 sq. ft house would cost some €360,000 plus VAT. The VAT on that house would be €48,600. That VAT is the first thing the Government could waive, which might bring us back into a slight part of redress. The percentage rate that we are missing is...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Remediation of Dwellings Damaged by the Use of Defective Concrete Blocks Bill 2022: Discussion (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: Has any of the witnesses put this into any of their submissions to the Government? Have the groups asked the Government to remove the 13.5% VAT for rebuilding costs on the houses with pyrite in order to bring them closer to getting the 100% redress they 100% need?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Remediation of Dwellings Damaged by the Use of Defective Concrete Blocks Bill 2022: Discussion (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: Mr. Doherty is 100% right. That has been taken off the table but it now needs to be looked at by the Government to say that it must come back in. That is a sizeable amount of money that would go a long way to helping with redress.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Remediation of Dwellings Damaged by the Use of Defective Concrete Blocks Bill 2022: Discussion (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: That to me is absolutely disgraceful. It is one thing they could actually go along with. It is also very easy to police because an invoice could still be issued including the VAT and then it would go back to Revenue with a zero VAT rating on it for people who have pyrite or mica in their houses. It could very easily be looked at and very easily managed. It would be transparent across the...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Remediation of Dwellings Damaged by the Use of Defective Concrete Blocks Bill 2022: Discussion (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: Based upon the problem which we seem to have in areas of this country at the moment with pyrite and mica, would it not be the right thing to core test every house that will be retrofitted in this country before one retrofits it? The information coming back is showing that houses in certain areas would have a minimum amount of insulation in their cavities and when their cavities are pumped...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Remediation of Dwellings Damaged by the Use of Defective Concrete Blocks Bill 2022: Discussion (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: I am asking our witnesses for their opinion on this matter.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Remediation of Dwellings Damaged by the Use of Defective Concrete Blocks Bill 2022: Discussion (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: Well, it is-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Remediation of Dwellings Damaged by the Use of Defective Concrete Blocks Bill 2022: Discussion (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: We will move then to the engineers, who may want to answer this question.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Remediation of Dwellings Damaged by the Use of Defective Concrete Blocks Bill 2022: Discussion (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: Perhaps Mr. Forde has experience of this matter.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Remediation of Dwellings Damaged by the Use of Defective Concrete Blocks Bill 2022: Discussion (23 Jun 2022)

Richard O'Donoghue: With Mr. Forde's vast amount of experience would he not agree that prevention would be better than cure and that a core test is done to ensure we are not accelerating the issue of pyrite in houses?