Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I recognise and agree fully that the schools should have been informed, but the policy of the Department at the time, before the protocol was put in place, was to pursue issues with the fire office and the contractor in order to have works conducted.

That was the approach taken. In this case, of course, the Department discovered that the undertakings made were not conducted in the manner expected and that is the reason the Department intervened. We are changing the policy and the schools will be informed from the beginning. The approach that was not one of neglecting to work on correcting the issues. The issue of whether this represents misconduct or misrepresentation would have to be proven in a court of law in order to disqualify a person from applying to tender. We are taking legal advice on the whole matter and the rights we have. We are not holding back on ensuring that the issues that have arisen are remediated while waiting for the outcome.

Deputy Boyd Barrett is no longer present, but the defects were not identified in a school back in 2008 but in 2015. That was what triggered the decision to conduct additional audits.

Every application from a school in respect of a fire issue, a snag list or an audit will be dealt with. Things will come up in that area in respect of applications for emergency works. Every application will go to this internal committee to make sure that nothing is missed. On the issue of who signed off that the building was compliant, at that time it was down to the contractor to sign off on compliance. Since 2014 the requirements to sign off on compliance have changed considerably and it is the professionals, the various architects, designers and so on, who must also certify professionally that the work has been done in accordance with the permissions and the fire certificates.

As I said, what has changed is that not only are we alerting the designers and architects of all schools and their professional organisations of their obligations, under the new approach we have a designated certifier in place who on behalf of the Department certifies that the work is done. In addition we are putting in a clerk of works on to the site to act as the eyes and ears of the Department in respect of the conduct of the work. That is a much strengthened approach to ensuring compliance, not just with the fire certificate but other dimensions which Deputy Byrne raised concerns about earlier.