Garret Ahearn (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I also welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Calleary, to the Chamber. It is my first opportunity to congratulate him on his new role and position. I thank him for taking this Commencement matter. I acknowledge the good work he and his Department did last week in regard to the budget and supporting business over what is going to be an uncertain time during the winter months.

I had a meeting a number of weeks ago with Mr. Patrick Fox from the Bromine Science and Environmental Forum, BSEF, on fire regulations. The BSEF is based in Brussels but works in regulations throughout Europe. There is an opening in Ireland, essentially because of Brexit, and our Irish fire furniture regulations might be changing. We are in a position at the moment where our current regulations are very much in line with the UK. They are very safe and very good and there are many restrictions in place for furniture that can be produced and sold in Ireland. The fear is the regulations might change to be more in line with the EU. The worry with that is that research has shown that regulations within the EU and the US are not to the same standard as those of Ireland and the UK. There is a worry that because we are part of the European Union and Brexit has happened, we will try to move more in line with EU regulations. There is certainly a fear from the sector and the industry that that might be a bad thing.

This is really to get some clarity from the Minister of State's and the Department's perspective on where and how this is going and whether open dialogue and consultation between both sides can continue while that process is happening. There are a couple of things the industry wanted to get across on the regulations in place at the moment. It is its understanding that the intention is to review the furniture fire regulations but that any updates to Ireland's regulations should continue to guarantee current high fire safety levels through the comprehensive legislation, the robust standards and the stringent testing regimes, including the import of furniture from third countries. The Irish regulations and standards are based on those of the UK and are deemed to be almost identical by standards experts. The fire fatality rate for the UK and Ireland is approximately half of that of continental Europe and the USA. A defining characteristic is testing of furniture materials with both a smouldering and open flame ignition. It found the changes to testing regimes in the US, such as removing the open flame testing, suggested an increase in domestic fire mortalities and, therefore, advised caution with any of these reviews.

I do not know if the Minister of State has had an opportunity to see a visual representation of two rooms, one done to EU and US regulations and another done to UK and Irish regulations, where a fire is started at the same time in both rooms and to see how quickly one room develops into a terrible situation while in the other room, the fire progresses but at a much slower rate, giving a much better chance for people to vacate the room and the building. It is a genuine concern from its perspective but I look forward to hearing the Minister of State's response.