CONSERVATION WORKS at Leinster House are being scaled back due to lack of funding.
The Georgian building on Kildare Street in Dublin has not been rewired since the 1960s, so this work will take place during the summer recess this year and in 2012, but other planned projects will be postponed.
Only “urgent necessary safety and structural works are being proceeded with” by the Office of Public Works (OPW), minutes of the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission’s latest meeting show.
“To secure the continued safety of the building, the OPW now propose to proceed with the rewiring of the building to address the fire risk from the current age/condition of the wiring, and the risk this poses to people in the building and structurally to the building itself,” the minutes state.
The construction of the final section of an underground link from the original Leinster House building to Agriculture House, also on Kildare Street, will be postponed “until accommodation becomes available when space is freed up as a consequence of the decentralisation of the staff in the Department of Agriculture to Portlaoise”. The minutes reveal: “There has been some slippage date-wise on the decentralising of these staff to Portlaoise.”
The OPW has requested approval for the use of a section of Leinster Lawn as an access area for builders and contractors while roof repairs are carried out at the National Gallery. The commission offered conditional approval provided “52 replacement car parking spaces are sourced in advance of the commencement of the works”.
Replacement car parking spaces will be sourced before the works start from property already owned or leased by the OPW in the vicinity, the OPW said.
