Mr. David Browne:

It is worth reminding ourselves that building is complex and the requirements to ensure compliance between 1990 and now have grown quite considerably. Section 11 of the 1990 Act refers to the authorised person. It states who that person is but I wonder if it would now make sense to set further criteria for what their qualifications might be to deal with this much more complex world that we live in. On the Construction Industry Register Ireland, CIRI, system, if one wishes to move quickly with the aspirations of the Bill, the CIRI system has been set up in reasonable good faith, I believe, by the Construction Industry Federation, CIF, and has a degree of robustness about it. It may be a milestone on the way to achieving full independent certification or registration of builders. It may be that it could be implemented on a short-term basis to enable the system to proceed. On local authority resourcing, as I have said, there is a very large issue to be faced with regard to increasing resources so that they would be adequate for inspection requirements.