Dr. Aideen Hartney:

I thank the Deputy. I welcome her approach to the design of her own office in that respect. It is very much what we would advocate. Universal design, for other committee members who may be less familiar, is the design of the physical or digital environment, or product and service, so that it can be accessed, used and understood by everybody regardless of age, size, ability or disability. Ireland is unique in having a statutory centre sitting within the NDA that promotes excellence in universal design.

However, I suggest that the uptake or application is still at a relatively early stage. Much work has been done in building awareness but that needs to translate into implementation at this stage. In our centre, we are presenting several resources, toolkits and guides that can be picked up and used by built environment professionals in various scenarios. We have, for example, created a checklist as to what the key elements of a universal design home would be. We are currently quite advanced in preparing a draft standard for universal design dwellings. This will go to public consultation shortly and we hope it will be finalised at the end of the year. We have a code of practice for accessible public buildings in draft form that is with the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality for approval.

All of these resources should provide the must-dos and should-dos for scenarios such as that described by the Deputy and especially in the public realm. Challenges arise sometimes in the private sector. It is about incentivising and encouraging developers in this space to take on universal design. There is a lack of understanding or a variable understanding of what is involved and I think this is where these resources will be very helpful in terms of standardising approaches. One of the things we would really have liked to have seen in the draft strategy - it was not in the latest version we saw - was a commitment to review Part M of the building regulations in terms of housing. At the moment, houses are built to a standard where they are visitable, but that is not sufficient for people who have wheelchairs or other mobility aids. We would welcome a review of the regulations to achieve that level of livability. The variability of targets across local authority areas is another issue in this respect. There is a disparity between what is being called for in our ageing policies and in our disability policies, but there was a call for 30% of all houses in local authority public housing to be built to universal design standards. This is not being universally applied and we would welcome approaches in that regard.