Mr. John O'Mahony:

I am the RIAI's spokesperson on housing and I thank the committee for the invitation to address it. I would like to introduce my colleague, Mr. Peter Bluett, an architect and fire engineer who sat on the fire safety task force.

Founded in 1839 and now comprising 3,380 members, the RIAI is the support and registration body for architects in Ireland and the membership body for architectural technologists. The RIAI works to ensure the safety of the public through the efficient and effective administration of the register of architects and the maintenance of standards within architectural education.

Since the introduction and ongoing implementation of BCAR, the RIAI considers this legislation to be far-reaching in improving the standards of design and construction of building, particularly the building of houses and apartments. BCAR, SI 9 of 2014, ensures that all parties involved in the design and construction are aware of their responsibilities. These responsibilities are confirmed by documentation, inspection plans, certification and ancillary certification, enabling houses and apartments to be registered on the local authority register.

The RIAI acknowledges the annual reviews of SI 9 of 2014 by the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government and the construction industry and has proposed a number of amendments to the legislation which we believe will further improve the purpose of the legislation. First, putting the Construction Industry Register Ireland, CIRI, on a statutory footing would help to ensure appropriate competencies in building, which is the principal way of ensuring compliant and good quality building. The requirements that such developments are carried out by members of a statutory CIRI register should be seriously considered in the legislation.

Second, the introduction of the requirement for latent defects insurance, LDI, for all new housing and apartments should be executed by the developer during the conveyancing process to ensure consumer protection. LDI, when invoked, enables the insurer to immediately rectify the construction defects without recourse to law and at no cost to the consumer of the property, usually up to a ten-year period.

Third, we propose the repeal of Statutory Instrument 365 of 2015. The RIAI considers SI 365 is not in the consumer interest, either in short or long term, as the rigours of this statutory instrument are diluted to such an extent that it could permit bad construction practice without recourse for the consumer and subsequent consumers.

The RIAI, in conjunction with Association of Consulting Engineers of Ireland, ACEI, Engineers Ireland and the Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland, made technical recommendations for amendment to the Vacant Housing Bill 2017. I will briefly outline our 11 recommendations.

We identified that there is no need for a second layer of building regulation technical documents as proposed in the Bill. A single suite of technical guidance documents relating to the vacant homes legislation should be specific and sufficient. Documentation required at application stage should demonstrate compliance with the building regulations and the documentation should be described in the Bill.

Any existing vacant building being considered for occupancy must be structurally assessed by a qualified structural engineer and a condition survey executed by a qualified architect or building surveyor, all of whom must be covered by professional indemnity insurance.

Applications for the use of vacant properties should include proposals for dealing with specific risks, including radon, avoiding cold bridging and mould growth, timber rot and pests and access and facilities, particularly for people with compromised mobility.

The provisions of the Bill are not capable of coming into immediate effect as the local authorities' level of resources and competencies need to be put in place with the assistance of central government. Therefore, the Bill should not proceed to have force until these resources are carefully evaluated and demonstrably provided. Further focus on utilising the existing framework under the Building Control (Amendment) Regulation, BCAR, system should be considered.

The competency of authorised persons both at assessment of technical submission and inspection of works stages should be defined. These competencies must align with those of design certifier and assigned certifier as set out in Statutory Instrument 9 of 2014.

The proposed inspection plan must align in compliance and complexity with the SI 9 risk based inspection plan and be executed in accordance with the code of practice for inspecting and certifying buildings and works.

The employment of the project supervisor design process, PSDP, and project supervisor construction stage, PSCS, will still be required as per SI 9. Issues relating to co-owned party walls require particular attention. The provision of a fast-track appeals process must also be considered.

We have concerns regarding the replacement of the BCAR model with the permit approval process as we consider it is impracticable to enforce and will undermine the current regulation procedure.

I will now address fire safety in houses and apartments. The code of practice for fire safety in flats of July 1994 could be reconsidered and updated to deal with change of use of existing buildings to apartments and flats, rather than a new full technical guidance document. The current 1994 document is valid for existing buildings containing flats and existing mixed use, but does not cover change of use.

The RIAI would welcome the publication for consultation of an updated technical guidance document, Part B, which will include provisions for apartments and other buildings.

There are practicability issues for upgrading of existing buildings, in particular in relation to change of use of existing building stock. Current technical guidance documents are more appropriate for new builds.

Concerns relating to the construction stage and quality of workmanship and training, certification of quality of work in timber frame and stud partition systems, fire stopping, etc., could be addressed by the introduction of the CIRI legislation.