Dr. Gerald Craddock:

I thank the Deputy for her questions. Regarding Part M, at the present moment we are creating guidance to match the work being done by the Department on changing places and toilets. Part M is being revised to included those. However, we have been advocating and advising the Government, particularly the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, that Part M needs to be revised specifically regarding domestic homes. At present, Part M refers to "visitability", an unusual word in itself, whereas we talk about livability, meaning the homes need to be liveable in. Visitability stipulates level access, an accessible toilet downstairs and access to one other room. That is what it is within Part M, which is a bit short on what we are looking for. ILMI is very exercised about this and is talking to the Department about getting Part M revised.

The Deputy asked about the cost of universal design. Going back to Mr. Harris's point, if it is done at the very start universal design is invisible. We go to the supermarket every weekend or whatever and walk through sliding doors. We never even think about it but there is level access, car spaces right at the entrance to the shopping mall and accessible toilets within the shopping mall. It is a negligible cost if designed at the start. We are working on two projects at the moment - a cost-benefit analysis of universal design for homes and a cost assessment that breaks down the individual elements. We have calculated that there are 659 different elements in the home that need to be designed or incorporated. Of that, over 600 have no cost so we are down to around 50 elements where there is a cost element. We are working through that at the moment. We are working with the Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland SCSI and engaging with the Department. The other project, the cost-benefit analysis, looks at the other long-term benefits of designing well from the start, such as cutting down on the cost of care and reducing the cost of medical supervision but also the issue of falls. As we all know, particularly with the ageing population, people often fall in their own homes. The reason for that is that they are designed poorly. If we can get the design right at the start, there are huge savings. That has been shown internationally. We are in regular contact with the likes of the Norwegians, who are leaders in Europe on this. The Japanese have been designing this in for 40 years, mainly because they are seen as the most aged population in the world. We are making headway but, as everybody has said, we have some way yet to go.