Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

This is an issue about which Deputy Cowen has real concerns. I share these concerns so I have put much time and effort into meeting people in the business who are becoming assigned certifiers and carrying out this work. There is a great range of costs out there. We are analysing these costs in our Department. We have two working groups on the overall costs of construction, which Deputy Cowen and I have discussed. The Deputy has had discussions with the Minister, Deputy Coveney, on the matter as well. There are two separate reports analysing all the costs. It might not be the case that we compare that badly with other countries, from what I can see, but we analyse this as well and we must keep pushing the cost down.

There is much misinformation out there in respect of the assigned certifier. I stress, and I have said this before, that the Committee on Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government, of which the Deputy is a member, could do great work to analyse and go through this area as a committee and a public forum. I have met companies and individuals who can do this work at much lower prices than those I am hearing about. I stress that the committee is a perfect place to analyse this and I would encourage it to do so. The work we are doing in the working group on vacant buildings, both commercial and residential, is about trying to find ways to reduce the costs and the timelines and make it viable to bring these buildings back into use. The repair-and-lease initiative was discussed today. That is what this is about. We recognise that people sometimes own these properties but have no cash and cannot bring them back into use. Therefore, we are finding ways to make money available upfront to bring them back into use. However, we must try to adjust the rules and regulations without reneging on quality, design or the historic purpose of the building. There are other ways to take a more common sense approach to this-----

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