Health officials told the Commonwealth in 1968 that the man now known as Mr Fluffy should be stopped in his tracks. But as ACT Chief Minister Katy Gallagher pointed out, he continued to operate for another 11 years.

There is also a suggestion in historic documents that a second company might have operated in Sydney installing asbestos in a similar manner to Mr Fluffy, despite previous belief that Mr Fluffy was the only company anywhere using pure asbestos as insulation, but authorities were unable to shed any light on this.

Ms Gallagher pressed Senator Abetz this week for agreement on the Mr Fluffy crisis, hoping to meet her mid-August deadline for a decision. But Senator Abetz's only public response came in radio comments, where he said: ''Until the whole issue is fully scoped both financially, legally, etc, I have indicated that I am not willing to make a commitment other than to get all the information together and then come to a right and proper conclusion based on that information.''

The ACT government is considering a buyback and demolition of the homes. It wants the Commonwealth to help it pay, in line with an agreement signed 20 years ago.

Backing her case, Ms Gallagher also has advice from federal health officials in July 1968, asking the Commonwealth to ''dissuade or even prevent'' Dirk Jansen from using asbestos as home insulation. Mr Jansen began only in 1967 or 1968. Despite the advice, which went to the secretary of the Department of the Interior and the secretary-manager of the National Capital Development Commission, he continued operating until 1979.

The advice also refers to another company, Bowsers Asphalt of Rozelle, which was considering setting up operations in Canberra, ''having used asbestos in a similar manner in Sydney for the past 13 years''.

''With the present demand for insulation, Canberra may become a large market for asbestos insulation, with many people in the community exposed,” the advice, signed by ''G. Major, physicist'' in the Department of Health, says.

Mr Major said he had inspected Mr Jansen’s company at work. As described to The Canberra Times by a former worker, two men did the job, one feeding the material by hand into a hopper and the other standing in the roof and directing the asbestos hose. They insulated four homes a day. Former worker David Laughlan said he had no protective equipment, but Mr Major said the two men he witnessed were wearing masks, one a paper mask of no value, and the other an inadequate mask with filters placed in the wrong way. ''Both men were clearly exposed to excessive asbestos dust,'' he said, urging thought be given to dissuading or preventing Mr Jansen from doing the work. The evidence was ''not completely convincing'' but was being taken seriously and it would be prudent to limit asbestos to essential uses only, he said.

Ms Gallagher said the advice had been clear. ''The advice Is that steps should be considered to be taken to stop this business operating, that the harmful effects of asbestos were well known and that the activity, the way he was doing it, was dangerous to people's health and potentially to the community,'' she said.

''That advice was there in 1968 ... and he operated in Canberra until 1979. So he was in a sense unregulated for another 11 years.''

Meanwhile, the fear that office building Northbourne House could have been contaminated with Mr Fluffy was put to rest yesterday, when Robson Environmental told authorities it was confident the building had never contained loose-fill asbestos. A former Defence employee said amosite asbestos was found there in 1990, but Work Safety Commissioner Mark McCabe said amosite asbestos was used in a number of building products, usually in bonded form. The building had contained sprayed asbestos and pipe lagging containing asbestos, which had been removed, he said.

Robson’s Ged Keane said Mr Fluffy was used where roof tiles could be lifted out, whereas most commercial buildings had a sealed roof with no access and no suspended ceiling.

The National Asbestos Exposure Register was amended this week so people can register Mr Fluffy exposure, including how long they had lived at a Mr Fluffy home.