Irish Examiner view: Celtic Tiger’s legacy of shoddy building work

A deserted Priory Hall in October 2011 as the final deadline for residents to leave their apartments passed. Picture: Colin Keegan, Collins, Dublin.

The scale of the shoddy and dangerous building work carried out during the Celtic Tiger years is a crisis that has been hiding in plain sight for years — it’s just that no-one has wanted to dwell on it for too long for fear of being held responsible.

But the figures are worth pondering; it is estimated that, out of the 170,000 apartments built between 1990 and 2013, as many as 100,000 could be affected by structural or fire safety defects. 

That’s potentially 100,000 homes in need of repair, with families out of pocket due to no fault of their own.

The Irish Examiner’s Mick Clifford has done much to give a voice to those left in the lurch: Priory Hall, north Dublin — the first and most infamous case of fire safety defects; Longboat Quay, Dublin; Beacon South Quarter, Dublin; Riverwalk Court, Co Meath; Bru Na Sionna, Co Clare; Ath Lethan, Co Louth; The Oaks, Co Westmeath — just some of the developments highlighted over the years. 

Different families all have the same story — light-touch regulation, defective works, massive repair bills, no way of paying, and no-one to hold accountable — not the developer, not the council, not the State.

One of the homeowners who spoke to this newspaper summed up the frustration and anger: 

“The people who created this mess, the developer, the architect, and Westmeath County Council, have walked away without being held accountable for what they did. I am paying rent in another house because I couldn’t bear to live in it anymore.”

I can’t afford to buy again as I’m considered a second-time buyer and can’t sell the apartment because of the issues.

Under the programme for government, Housing Minister Darragh O’Brien set up a working group to assess the work practices during the boom and to recommend how homeowners should be compensated.

First estimates put the average bill per apartment of dealing with fire remediation at €17,000 — but that’s just the fire regulation works. When structural works and water leaks are factored in, the bills rise to €35,000.

But the most important figure for the minister to work out is the number of apartments affected. 

The Construction Defects Alliance (CDA), which so far represents 20,000 impacted homeowners, puts the bill at €1bn, but that could be a conservative estimate with many defects yet to come to light.

Then there is the issue of who is going to pick up the tab? In many cases, going after the developer is not an option as many are no longer in operation. 

The CDA has suggested the introduction of a 1% levy on the output of the construction industry, which it says would generate €320m annually. 

There were concerns over fire safety at Longboat Quay apartments on Sir John Rogerson's Quay in Dublin. Picture: Fergal Phillips

This will only add to the price of new homes, though, at a time when housebuilding is threatened by rising costs.

The CDA also suggested owners should be treated in the same manner as those impacted by mica or pyrite. 

Both those schemes provide for 100% remediation grants — up to a maximum of €420,000 per home for mica; the mica compensation scheme alone could set the taxpayer back more than €3bn.

How much appetite and political will there is in government to follow through on that is yet to be tested, but with more pressing bills mounting elsewhere, it’s not going to be straightforward. 

You can bet your house on that.