Ms Orla Hegarty:

The issue of overcrowding and illegal conversions is not going to go away. If anything, it is getting worse. There are no mechanisms or resources to deal with enforcement. There are multiple different inspections for different purposes with many overlaps. All of these inspections have the same purpose, whether it is for these conversions, for HAP, housing assistance payment, or for the RTB, Residential Tenancies Board. They are all about the safety of the resident, effectively, and personal safety. Many of them are looking at exactly the same thing such as whether there is a fire alarm, is it working, is there a fire exit or is there ventilation in the bedrooms?

It is an ad hocarrangement. I have spoken to people involved in these inspections for local authorities. Some are being done by environmental health departments in local authorities while others are done by building control. Some are outsourced by the building control department into frameworks with private operators reporting to the local authority. There is no consistency with the checklists they are using or the fees they are paying. There is no transparency for people who have a property.

For example, if one had a HAP tenant in a RTB-registered converted building, notionally one could have a BCAR, building control amendment regulations, inspection if the two apartments in the building were fitted out. One could then be on a list for a RTB inspection sometime between now and 2021, which is a different process. Similarly, one could then have a HAP inspection, which should happen within eight months of a tenant moving in but often is longer. This could impose a third checklist on the landlord to do work or the HAP payment will stop.

The potential of this authorised person regime would give a local authority a panel of people who would be appropriate to the needs of whatever the inspection was and who could be ticking off the same list. In some cases, it might be checking if there is a fire alarm and a fridge in the kitchen. In other cases, it might have to call in a fire officer to look at something more complex. It would effectively streamline the various processes which are all doing the same thing.