Brian Hayes (Fine Gael)

I commend Senator O'Toole and the Independent group on tabling this motion tonight. I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Batt O'Keeffe, for attending and peddling exactly the same arguments made to me when I first raised this matter in 1999 as housing spokesperson for my party in the other House. The Minister of State's speech could have been cut and pasted from what his colleague, Deputy Noel Dempsey, the former Minister for the Environment and Local Government, told me in 1998 and 1999.

The use of hollow block construction in the Dublin residential property market is one of the greatest scams in the construction industry and took place under the noses of successive Government for the past 20 years. A future Government will have the courage to stop this practice and ensure decent homes for young people who wish to buy in the capital. No other part of this country accepts the use of hollow block construction.

The Minister of State is right when he endorses the view of UCD research published in 2000: "The results of this study show that hollow block construction could be insulated to comply with proposed higher thermal performance standards." The issue turns on the word "could". There is no doubt that it can be used, but even if that construction method can meet the thermal performance range to which the Minister of State refers when he speaks of technical guidance part L of the building regulations, it requires twice as much time as cavity wall insulation, three times as much time as timber frame housing and twice as much insulation foam to make the house and external walls safe. That is the problem.