Dáil debates

Wednesday, 23 March 2022

Regulation of Providers of Building Works Bill 2022: Report and Final Stages

 

7:17 pm

Photo of Eoin Ó BroinEoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 14:

In page 20, to delete lines 18 to 23 and substitute the following: "(3) The chairperson of the Board shall be appointed through the Public Appointments Service and shall have knowledge and experience of construction, building control, building standards, planning and related legislation; and other areas that the Minister may specify by way of regulations.".

Again, I do not want to repeat a debate we had on Committee Stage. While the Minister of State, Deputy Burke, did not accept earlier amendments, he did indicate that there may be some reconsideration from the Government's point of view of the configuration of the board or membership of the board. Can the Minister of State give us an update on whether that work has progressed, if there still is work ongoing within the Department in that regard and if the Government is likely to bring forth an amendment on this general area during the passage of the Bill through the Seanad, albeit not on the specific issues we mentioned here? The real concern for many of us, which goes back to the issue of independence, is that the independence is somewhat undermined in my view, first, by the Minister not requiring the involvement of the Public Appointments Service and, second, by the very heavy dependence on staff from Government Departments and the Construction Industry Federation. Why not, as set out in amendment No. 17, have a process combined of the Public Appointments Service nominations with nominations from a variety of bodies to ensure the full range of knowledge, skills and experience is obtained from, for example, the range of agencies such as the Irish Planning Institute, the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, the Society of Chartered Surveyors of Ireland and Construction Defences Alliance representing householders who are impacted by negligent or shoddy building work, etc?

I know the Minister of State does not propose to accept this group of amendments, but he might update us on whether work is under way on reconfiguring what is currently in the Bill.

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