Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The petitioner went further than the 100,000 houses. He suggested that with the dead-leg part, about which we talked earlier, in the hot tank, it could potentially be more than 300,000 houses. I do not know because, as I said, I am not an expect. I would have presumed that if somebody flagged a potential issue - the argument is the same with others - somebody needs to do an audit by checking a number of the estates the petitioner has spoken about in his letters to the committee to see whether it is an issue and then one would have some idea. The petitioner made the point that there is a number of estates in an area in Meath that had the problems identified by him. I presume that is where he works or worked, and that he came across shoddy workmanship. That is often the way one identifies the likes of a fire hazard or, in this case, a potential health hazard. If that is the case, then somebody needs to conduct an audit of those houses and also flag to other plumbers that if they identify this problem when doing work on heating systems throughout the country, they should fix it but refer it to the authorities so that we can audit the rest of the estates concerned. If a plumber walks into a house in an estate in County Kildare and identifies that nobody has been near the heating system since it was built but there is a problem, that person should inform somebody that there may be a problem in the estate, especially if, potentially, it is of a public health nature.

As I said in regard to other matters, some of it would involve an audit and some of it would involve inspections. Since the inspections we are talking about are for future builds, somebody somewhere has to look at the existing houses otherwise one will end up with what we have in Dublin with the lead pipes that I mentioned. The house that I moved out of had lead pipes which had swollen to three times the size. That was the nature of all of the Dublin City Council houses. I do not know whether it was a major health hazard but, as far as I know, lead in water is a health hazard. Maybe drinking that water is why I am a bit mad. It is something that Irish Water has identified in its documentation to date. It has not come up with a solution other than that the householder will fix that part.