Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 31 January 2018

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government

Vacant Housing Refurbishment Bill 2017: Discussion (Resumed)

1:30 pm

Photo of Grace O'SullivanGrace O'Sullivan (Green Party) | Oireachtas source

Similarly, the Green Party and Civil Engagement in the Seanad are interested in supporting this legislation. The Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland, SCSI, and the Royal Institute of the Architects of Ireland, RIAI, raised concerns about the competence of authorised persons who will carry out the inspections under the system. The authorised person regime has been in place since 1992 and is the basis for all local authority building control inspections. This objection makes no sense. If the Bill is not passed, the same regime will continue to apply. Local authority building inspectors do not have to be registered under the 2007 Building Control Act as assigned certifiers do.

Both the SCSI and the RIAI raised concerns about local authority resources. With them both trenchant in their support of the Construction Industry Register Ireland, CIRI, without having been given any evidence how that system is to be resourced and how the CIRI system register will be used to assess the competence of builders, the resourcing of local authority building control is a significant problem of long-standing as recognised in the Safe As Houses report. The recommendation that local authority building control be reviewed and resourced in the Safe As Houses report would align with an increased role for authorised persons as contemplated by this Bill. Will the witnesses comment on that?

Both the SCSI and the RIAI suggested the Bill would compromise safety, which obviously would be a significant issue for the committee and, moreover, for the public. Will they explain why a system where there will be inspections by authorised persons under the existing Building Control Act regime before a certificate of occupancy is granted can be less safe than the existing system where there may be no inspections, given that many local authorities report they inspect only 12% to 15% of construction works?

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