§ Mr. Dudley Smithasked the Secretary of State for the Environment what arrangements are in existence at the present time to ensure that insurance-backed guarantees for cavity wall insulation provide for consequential trouble such as water penetration; and what steps have been taken to ensure that all the major firms in the United Kingdom concerned with cavity wall insulation are obliged to provide such guarantees.
§ Mr. FreesonCavity wall insulation, if properly carried out in the right circumstances, can make a useful contribution to energy saving and is not likely to cause water penetration. It is for this reason that we have given a type relaxation of the building regulation prohibiting the bridging of cavity walls to those firms who insulate cavity walls in accordance with the terms of an Agreement certificate. The insurance-back guarantee provided by a number of firms is an additional reassurance, but I have no power to require firms to give such guarantees, or to regulate such guarantees as the firms themselves may choose to give.