The government is expected to approve a scheme to repair Celtic Tiger apartment defects which could cost the State up to €2.5 billion.
Housing Minister Darragh O'Brien is bringing the memo to Cabinet, which will cover fire, structural safety and water-caused defects on apartment buildings and duplexes built between 1991 and 2013.
It's expected somewhere between 62,500 and 100,000 housing units are affected and the average cost of remediation will be around €25,000.
This leaves a potential cost to the State of between €1.56 billion and €2.5 billion.
The scheme is likely to be administered by the Housing Agency, with Owners' Management Agencies funded to carry out the repair works to entire buildings.
The scheme will be done on a 100% basis, with all the costs met by the State.
This new programme, combined with the Mica and pyrite scheme previously revealed to be costing €2.7 billion, means the State, and taxpayers, will end up paying more than €5 billion to fix building defects mostly from the Celtic Tiger.
Discussions between Minister O'Brien and the Attorney General's office about whether the builders at fault can be made to pay redress are still ongoing.
Members of the Construction Defects Alliance, which is linked with over 200 defective developments around the country, will be briefed this morning ahead of the announcement.
Spokesperson Pat Montague, says the new scheme is welcome but says funding must be made available for all defects, including to property owners who've already paid for repair works.
"Detail is crucially important. In particular, we need to make sure that the government fully funds remediation works.
"It's crucial that the scheme will be retrospective. It should include people who have paid or are paying towards remediation works already, to ensure that those works continue and we don't end up in an appalling situation where works grind to a halt cause of uncertainty over funding".
