Mica Redress

People need to own their Mica issues more than they are. Their builders should have sought certification for the blocks they used. Why didn't they and why was the build allowed to go ahead without this official certification?

Blaming the Government is like blaming Tesco for somebody choking on a pizza.

The remarks are not at all surprising, since it is an accurate description of the ask.

Was it all quarries in Donegal / Mayo & Sligo that supplied these blocks or only certain ones in certain area's?

Does this have the potential of a lot more homes affected that have yet to be tested & come forward?

Certain ones in certain areas - defective blocks now an issue in Donegal, Mayo, Sligo, Clare, Limerick, Westmeath, Dublin (original pyrite issue - presumably resolved), and more than likely more areas yet to come out. Most people were largely unaware of defective blocks and the signs until recently.

Quarries are still a law unto themselves in this country, so pyrite, mica, pyrrhotite and more are still being found in blocks in larger quantities than is safe.

Are all homes that bad? Of course not. Only a small quantity of them are. Presenting the worst case as typical is disingenuous.

If you look at the mica map and then view the houses on it, you'd hardly know any of them had this defect. With proactive maintenance, many of these would likely survive to the 50 year mark.

What would you do if your inner leaf then began to shows signs of mica cracking years later?

That would be most unlikely. It's caused by water ingress. The only way that could happen is if did a piss poor job on the foundation intersection or new outter leaf was shoddy.

Or my roof tiles and substrate was also shoddy allowing water ingress.

Plus an external insulation to add a layer beyond typical render finish would be a belt and braces whilst also upping the home comfort.

Your scenario is highly unlikely unless you left it as long as your video which im in no doubt that has sustained double penetration. Or you had a very poor job done to remedy.

Many homeowner's have been filling cracks and repainting for years. But you're trying to hold back something you cant.

And im sure many dont have the means to replace the outer leaf.

Wrong. Pyrrhotite doesn't need water to react. Independent engineers have been trying to raise this but the government wont talk about it or include it in testing or IS 465, working group reports or anywhere else. They want to bring the whole process in house to the housing agency to push mica only testing for outer leaf fixes and kick the can down the road for when inner leafs and foundations fail. I find it pretty disgusting to try and blame home owners who cant pay for early outer leaf replacement for their houses falling down. There are plenty of examples of people who went ahead with outer leaf fixes when their inner leaf had no cracks but are being floored to discover their house is now cracking up internally.

Let's be fully and completely clear here.

I didn't blame homeowners at all. Once again dont come on here putting words I didn't say into my mouth, you have the run of the Donegal forum to do that .

I answered a question posed by niman fully and honestly. And it's exactly what I would have done faced with the same issue and done early .

Are these the same independent people that won't put their name to fixes ?

Also can you provide actual examples and full reports of people who have done what I said I'd do and where the fault lay? Because it's really like trying to pull teeth to get real hard factual information out of you. It's all a friend of a friend or a random article from someone in the Donegal gazette.

Jenerick on the BBC Politics Show today was talking about the faulty cladding on the high-rise blocks. Govt already allocated £5 bn to remove (only?) the faulty cladding. The overall fix will cost £15 bn to £50 bn. In the budget yesterday a developer tax was introduced to help pay - expected to raise £2 bn over 10 years. It seems the proposal now is to give Govt loans to the occupiers to organise and do the works.

Interesting article about LPT valuations today.

"Just over half of property owners who have so far submitted a valuation to Revenue – 52.4pc – choose the two lower valuation bands. This means that the majority of property owners who have so far submitted a valuation to Revenue will be paying less than €225 a year in the tax.

They have told tax officials their properties are worth less than €262,500.

Many of these homes are understood to be in rural areas."

If we use LPT returns to cap mica payouts, the scheme might be more sustainable.

I was just googling to see if there was any new of Government announcing a scheme, and came across this article which I thought was an interesting example of spin - just to be clear, far from unique to the mica campaign.

Now, they got me with that headline, as I read it because I thought to myself "sheesh, someone actually homeless as a result of this. That must be awful".

Then I read the story, only to find it's about someone actually getting their problem fixed. By the existing scheme. They are going to get their house demolished, and rebuilt with blocks tested as adequate. And that's heartbreaking.

And this is someone who, apparently, attended the protest in Dublin.

Made me think, I have to say.