No one seems accountable for defects in our buildings

How did we arrive at a state of affairs where people can spend hundreds of thousands of euro buying recently built apartments in Dublin and elsewhere, and then find that these properties, which allegedly met the necessary building standards and regulations, are not fit for purpose?

Worse still, not only are they not fit for purpose, they are potential death traps.

A normal ethical person would assume that these folk would have been given options of temporary accommodation and to have the properties remediated, or have their purchase money, legal costs and outlays refunded.

In this island of the three wise monkeys normal folk would be wrong. Unfortunately, evacuation on the instructions of the Fire Service is the likely result for the residents in the most recent case of a building having fallen short of the fire safety standard requirements.

Worse, residents were told that they all must pay up to €18,000 each for the extensive repairs and installations required.

To date a loose regulatory environment has been blamed for the deficiencies of bankers and builders. Self-regulation allows us to be judge and jury. We have become experts at demanding that the letter of the law be followed rather than the spirit of the law.

For what seems like a long time now this newspaper has extensively articulated the various cases of builders’ negligence occurring across the country.

It has highlighted the effects of the negligence on the lives and finances of their fellow citizens.

That nobody has died in any of the firetraps has been truly a miracle for which we must be grateful. Even now we do not know the full extent of the faults.

Despite the comprehensive coverage, the State has generally been churlish in its behaviour, uncaring in its general response and slow to respond with any action plan to ensure that it can never happen again.

Wherever possible it would appear that it wishes to put the blame elsewhere and responsibility for the remedial costs on the purchasers, who purchased these apartments following professionals’ reports prepared on behalf of the mortgage companies and that details were in order.

Owen Keegan, Dublin City Council CEO, speaking on behalf of the council, said that the council had “no direct role” and that it was “blindingly obvious” that it would not be in a position to source accommodation for the almost 900 residents.

In his role as chairman of the board of the Dublin Docklands Development Association, the owner of the common areas in Longboat Quay, he said that “we are not responsible for the construction and we have no contractual arrangement in relation to the standard of repair or the construction of the apartments”.

The owner of the company that built Longboat Quay has been declared bankrupt and has come out the other side.

He is not alone.

It is now apparent that those buildings so far exposed are potentially the tip of a very deep iceberg.

It has been recommended that the full extent of the problems can be determined by a detailed inspection but given the costs it has also been suggested that the inspection will not be done.

Despite the fact that problems came to light several years ago that led to the evacuation of Priory Hall, neither government, local authorities, professional associations and representative bodies appear to have done little.

In a nutshell, they are all responsible. The spirit of the law demands it. The fees they are paid for their services require it. The taxes we pay underscore it. They are all responsible and must be held accountable.

If the letter of the law isn’t good enough we must change the law and we must do it now.

To ensure that the banks and mortgage providers take a real interest in what is being built we must have non-recourse mortgages.

Now that is something that would keep bankers awake at night.