I want to be associated with the remarks about the staff and everybody in the House all year. I have a question on the unprecedented rise that has happened and is happening in the cost of construction materials. Building suppliers are getting daily notifications of price increases coming in January. Building contractors who are building some of the 30,000 homes the Tánaiste mentioned for local authorities throughout the country are trapped in a fixed-price contract. They cannot recover any of these increases.

Lately, the Office of Government Procurement issued a circular about tenders or contracts that have not yet been signed or contracts that are out for pricing and how to deal with the variation in prices in those contracts. There is a cohort of builders in this country comprising small and medium-sized contractors trapped in contracts that have no flexibility to give them something back towards the increases that have occurred. Has the Government any plans to facilitate this?

The Government is aware of the issue. It is complicated because it depends on the contract. Some contracts allow provision for inflation and some allow claims to be made for additional cost, while others do not. We have run into an issue around school-building where contractors tendered for a certain amount, believing they could build a school for that amount and make a reasonable profit. Now, because of the increased cost of building materials, they cannot build a school without making a substantial loss that they cannot bear. We are examining it but also want to make sure we are not taken advantage of and do not find that even more or all of the cost is passed on to us. The Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Michael McGrath, in particular, is working on it.