Mr. John O'Mahony:

We were asked whether the industry has the capacity to conduct the inspections. Until the introduction of the building control amendment regulations, as professionals, we did one inspection on a building on completion. We signed a certificate that, from a visible inspection on a single visit, the building complied with the building regulations. That was clearly totally inadequate at the time. Since the introduction of BCARs, I remember taking a look at the minimum number of inspections the professionals were carrying out on a very simple house, which was 36 inspections through the construction process. In our practice, the number would be higher than that and the inspections would be based not only on the inspection plan requirement but also on paying regular drop-in visits to the site.

As a professional practice with a large housing element, we deal with many dwelling houses. At the last count, it was 26,000 dwellings. We have specific inspection teams set up whose sole purpose is inspection. This involves not only inspecting projects but also informing the rest of the practice as to how regulations are changing. The bigger practitioners do this across the board. As a profession, building inspectors are stepping up, but there are still gaps, probably in the construction side.

Ventilation was raised and Ms Orla Hegarty spoke about it. In very simple terms, old buildings were leaky and cold and new buildings are sealed and warm and when one has a sealed, warm building with people breathing, cooking and so on, air must be extracted. Our regulations should be more specific about extracting and changing the air. Again from personal practice I find that introducing fresh air using modern system means the internal environment is amazingly different from the normal environment that we experience in old leaky houses.

One of the major issues is the retrofitting. We have 2 million dwellings in the country. While the regulations are terrific for the small but increasing number of new buildings since 2014, we then have all of the housing supply that must be retrofitted over time. That issue must be addressed but I am not sure how that will be done, whether one offers a carrot or uses the stick. Houses do not get built and knocked down, they last for centuries. Commercial buildings get knocked down and replaced, but houses do not. The next step is to look at a retrofitting system. My colleague, Mr. Bluett, wishes to comment.