MICA Action Group have secured two meetings with the Taoiseach, Micheál Martin today during his visit to Donegal.
The Fianna Fáil leader will visit the home of an affected homeowner as well as attend a meeting between Donegal County Council and the Mica Action Group to discuss the challenges they face in relation to the redress scheme.
PRO of the Mica Action Group, Michael Doherty said they are no longer calling for a demonstration as they have now secured what they wanted. A protest was due to take place later today at the Radisson Blu hotel to voice frustration about the scheme’s progress.
Last night the Taoiseach attended an event in the Playhouse theatre in Derry where protesters gathered with placards calling for 100 per cent redress for families. He was heckled by the crowd as he arrived.
Mr Doherty said they have now secured what they wanted from the start and will be showing the Taoiseach a home badly affected by the defective blocks.
“We will make sure that homeowner gets the time to express how they feel about the whole thing, how abandoned and how frustrated they are with the slow rate of progress,” he said.
“We have now secured a second shot with the Taoiseach, a meeting with Council.”
This meeting will be attended by Donegal County Council engineers involved in the scheme, CEO John McLaughlin, Chair of the Council’s Mica steering committee, Cllr Martin McDermott and the action group. Mr Doherty said this meeting needs to be an education for the Taoiseach.
“We want warts and all, we want and will make sure that Donegal County Council don’t hold back in saying where the frustrations are,” he said.
“Only with that education can he start to press the buttons that he has the power to press down there to move this scheme forward at a completely different rate.”
Given the two meetings have now been secured he said they are no longer calling for a demonstration in Letterkenny.
“We wanted that demonstration and in fairness you all stood up to be counted and that was to secure this meeting and we now have secured this meeting so I don’t see the need for that protest. We have got what we asked for,” he said.
“I don’t want that scuppered by a treasure hunt to see where we are at. What they will end up doing is driving on by and the story will go out then that for security reasons they weren’t able to have this meeting. We need this meeting. This is the meeting that gets them at government level and the top dog in the land, the Taoiseach to understand exactly what we are up against and why we are not making progress.”
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