Building Bill

This part gets to the heart of the bill—the responsibilities of the building consent authority. That is the area I want first to look at, and I intend seeking a number of calls. I hope I will get more than one call, because on the last part I got only one call. I was a member of the Government Administration Committee. I was seeking calls throughout the last part. On such important legislation, when the time comes that members on the select committee—[Interruption] I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): I know what the member is going to say. That is a personal reflection, as I understand it, under Standing Order 116, and the member will stand and apologise.

💬 Clayton Cosgrove: I apologise.

Shane Ardern and I were members of the select committee, and we had a lot of input into this legislation. The point that I was making was that during the last part I got only one call. I will later be seeking other calls, and I will be interested to have those.

I want to look specifically at clause 72, “Duties of building consent authority”. The private certifiers made very strong representations to us about it. Members will be aware that private certifiers are currently having difficulty with insurance, so their role over the last few years has been limited. But our view is that it is also a very important point that they have a part to play, and we should be accommodating them in such a way that they are able to provide the services that will expected under this new legislation.

It is interesting to consider what is actually required of the building consent authorities in this clause. The authorities include territorial local authorities and private certifiers. An interesting point came to my attention this morning. Someone involved in the industry came to visit me. He told me that products are certified; that under this bill builders will become licensed building practitioners; and that the building consent authorities, who will be the certifiers, will also have to be certified. The point was made that probably only one person in New Zealand has all the qualifications required to meet the specifications of this bill—only one person.

💬 Clayton Cosgrove: Name the person.

No, I will not name the person. For example, if we look at roofing, we see that many different types of roofing are involved, and special recognition has to be given to that in the bill. The same applies to windows, doors, or whatever. My visitor said that throughout the whole country there are probably only 10 to 20 people who over time, with some training, would be able to meet the requirements, yet the ministry has determined that we need a minimum of 200 people. To train those people up to the level of skills required under this part would take a minimum of a couple of years. He made the point that 30,000 houses a year are built, and if those properties can be inspected and certified for 50 weeks of the year, then the 20 staff who are currently available would have to do 30 inspections per week. It is absolute nonsense to expect those people to do what this bill is looking to achieve. Even if, after a couple of years, there are 200 staff, which is the number the ministry has said is the minimum requirement, they would have to do 600 inspections a week, or three per week each.

The point I am making is that the people with the expertise required are just not there. The territorial local authorities just do not have these sorts of people available to do the work the bill expects them to do. They are just not there. In fact, some councils, like the Tauranga District Council, do not have certifiers.

I have been seeking a call for some time, and it is with pleasure that I rise to speak against Part 2. I do so for a number of reasons. I listened with some interest earlier on to the contribution made by the member of the ACT party Richard Prebble, when he talked about the huge layer of cost that will be placed on people as a result of the passing of this legislation. I know that the member may not agree with this, but I say to members who are listening that this legislation is what we get when we have an urban-based lawyer in a party—the United Future party—that is elected to Parliament on list votes, yet gives unconditional support to the Government, and that party is asked how to fix leaks in houses—358 pages of bureaucratic regulation. That somehow or other—

💬 Hon Richard Prebble: I am also a member of a list party.

That is why I thought the member may not agree with me. The bill contains 358 pages of bureaucratic nonsense, which, of course, will sit on the ute’s seat, under the dog, next to the radio, when a poor, small-business person out there tries to go about his or her work. This legislation will not work; it will not stop a house from leaking. It will not address the problems faced by those in the building industry, and it certainly will not address the problems faced by the supporters of the Labour Party who thought they had elected a practical party that would represent their best interests.

I say to the Government members that one of their great former leaders, Norman Kirk, built his own house with his own hands. The question is, under regulation such as this, would he have been allowed to do that?

💬 Hon Richard Prebble: No.

The member over here—I think he was probably around Parliament at the time of Norman Kirk—can say, because he has a law degree, that the answer is no. I invite the Minister in the chair, the Hon John Tamihere, to take a call and tell us how Norman Kirk would have got on under provisions such as those in Part 2, whereby a certified building practitioner would have had to tell him whether he had done his job right. I can vaguely remember some of the comments made by Mr Kirk at the time towards the kinds of professional stickybeaks who poked their noses into things he was doing. They were not complimentary, and they certainly were not parliamentary—and that is exactly the response that we on the Opposition side of the Chamber have to this bill. It just will not work.

The Government Administration Committee heard from 150 submitters, and spent 29 hours and 30 minutes listening to those submitters and considering this bill—and I acknowledge the officials, who gave advice when questions were asked—and this is what the committee came up with. As my colleague Lindsay Tisch said, this legislation will not work, and it will run small businesses out of business.

I now come to clause 42, which refers to the special powers of the chief executive for monitoring the performance of functions under this Act. I ask the Minister in the chair, the Hon John Tamihere, who is also the Minister for Small Business, to take a call and explain to us how the chief executive will make sure that the person with the dog in the ute next to the radio, who is going about his or her work, ends up with a solid building that will not leak. How will the chief executive do that? Presumably, he or she will be based in Wellington, although maybe not; the position could be based in Auckland, given that the Minister comes from Auckland. What matters is how he or she is to achieve that goal. The only way the chief executive will achieve it is to tie that small-business person up in so much red tape—driven out of a law office in Lower Hutt, or wherever it may be, after the next election—that he or she goes out of business. That may stop that person from building a shonky house, but will it stop the fly-by-nighters who come from Australia or somewhere further afield, get involved in a major contract in Auckland, where this problem originated, use the wrong materials, and bring about a systemic failure, such as that identified in the leaky house report? Will it stop such a person from coming in, doing that work, and then disappearing over the horizon, never to be seen again or be tracked down by the law office in Lower Hutt? The answer is no, it will not. This legislation will not fix that.

It was interesting to hear other members on this side—the doomsayers—say that the measures in this part will not assist anyone. This part covers the functions, powers, and duties of the chief executive. One of the chief executive’s key powers is the power to act proactively. He or she will have the power to monitor the emerging trends in building materials, design, and construction, and to act immediately to ban any practices or materials until such time as they are proven to be acceptable. The chief executive will also have the power to prevent builders from practising if they prove themselves to be unworthy.

Everybody is saying that this will stop the DIY’er. It will not. The DIY’er—the good old Kiwi do-it-yourself bloke—who is handy, has the skills, and has the drive to do the job, will still be able to do it.

💬 Judith Collins: The red-blooded male.

If he has the ability to do the job, he will still be able to do it. The only part of the building process for which he will require the input of a licensed building practitioner is that regarding the outer envelope and any structural walls of the building. In everything else he will have all the abilities and freedoms to carry on. I can see that a process will develop under this bill whereby small businesses will put themselves out there to provide that service as a licensed building practitioner for those particular cases. Yes, there will be a slight increase in cost, but hang on—

💬 Brian Connell: Slight? Quantify it. Is $6,300 slight?

I ask the member how much it would cost him to insure a house that is likely to end up as a leaky home. I can tell him that no insurance company would touch that house.

💬 Brian Connell: Yes—nil.

The member says nil—therefore that house would be worthless. The owner of that house would lose considerable value in that house and a considerable amount of money. If the cost imposed by this bill comes to $6,000—some say it might even be $7,000—that is a small insurance policy for a guarantee that a house will be to a standard whereby it will not lose its value and will not end up worthless. I note that in many cases leaky homes have had to be demolished, and the owners have got absolutely nothing for it. Those people have had to start from scratch.

I would like to take up a point that Lindsay Tisch mentioned about private building consent certifiers. They are the experts. They have basically come out of territorial authorities, and they have the expertise. To shut them down now would be basically to tell them to go overseas and find ready work in Australia—because that is where they would go. They would not stay here and place themselves back with territorial authorities; they would move out of the whole industry and disappear across the Tasman. We can guarantee that. Many of them have spoken to me and raised that issue. They will not go back into the situation they were in prior to being able to become private building consent certifiers. So that is an issue the Government needs to sort out.

Part 2 outlines the roles and responsibilities of the chief executive and the local authorities. It puts us again in the situation of addressing the whole idea of private building certifiers. In terms of the bill as it stands, we will see a situation whereby four categories of people will certify buildings. We will have the territorial authorities, if they take the responsibility; we will have other territorial authorities that adopt, or are passed, the responsibility for their neighbouring authorities; and we will have council-controlled organisations—in my discussions with the Tauranga City Council, the council made it clear that effectively that is the way it will go.

That council is a very good case study, because at the moment in Tauranga, as some members will know, all certification work is done by private building certifiers. I went to Tauranga to talk to the council in terms of where that work was going to go and what was happening in the whole area of private building certification. They made it clear that they were very well aware that come January 2005 there would be no private building certifiers. The council is already starting to gear up to the idea of having a council-controlled organisation—separate from the Tauranga City Council but that will involve other councils—as a separate company that will do all the certification work for the Bay of Plenty area. That is how that council will address the issue. They reckon they can gear up with about a month’s notice, which belies what National members said earlier today when they suggested that that situation would be quite chaotic.

So we will have territorial authorities and neighbouring authorities doing the work for those authorities, we will have council-controlled organisations, and then there will be this thing called a “private building certifier”, which effectively will not exist. Under the terms of this bill, private building certifiers will be required to show they have sufficient financial backing in order to meet all civil liabilities. The only way they can do that will be either to inject into their companies millions of dollars of assets that are available as liquid assets to any claim, which is simply unrealistic, or to take out professional indemnity cover. But they cannot get professional indemnity cover.

The Government has assured me that it will stand firm on the requirement for financial backing, so, therefore, come January, when all the building certifiers’ licences come up for renewal, none of them will get renewed. The Tauranga City Council is expecting that, but other councils will be taken unawares and will find, all of a sudden, that there are a whole lot of building consents for which they have no building certifiers to action. That situation will suddenly be dumped on them. I have said continually—my second reading speech outlined this in depth—that the more responsible attitude would be to recognise the fact that there will be no building certifiers in January, and to provide in this legislation a phase-out period that would phase out private building certifiers within a certain time, because they cannot provide public back-up—

💬 Dr Wayne Mapp: Is that good or bad?

Well, if the certifiers could get back-up cover to provide consumer protection for the work they did, I would be very happy with them. The thing is that they cannot. Our trip to Australia made it abundantly clear that while we have joint and several liability in New Zealand we will not be able to get professional indemnity insurance. The only reason the Australians have any cover is that they do not have joint and several liability. Even then, the coverage is restricted. They can get it for only 6 years. They cannot get any run-off cover, and limitations are placed on building firms by their insurance companies that state, for example, that the firms are not allowed to do more than $1 million worth of work in a year. So the insurance companies are constricting the amount of work those consent authorities can do in 1 year, and therefore are inhibiting their productivity and financial viability. We will get that situation.

I have put forward a Supplementary Order Paper that would effectively provide for a 3-year period of transition to phase out private building certifiers. Effectively, I have provided that the only private building certifiers that can get certified under this bill are those that are council-controlled organisations. I have no problem with council-controlled organisations. They will still have to meet the requirements, but because councils can get sufficient cover through their rating base and through the provision of guarantees—[Interruption] Well, I have no problems with the rating base being used, because a regulatory authority is providing an assurance to the consumers of our society—homeowners—that those homes will be to a good standard for the benefit of future purchasers.

I will make just a quick response to the points made by the United Future party. No one else in the country thinks the country’s dozen or so private building certifiers are responsible for the problems facing the industry. I am amazed that United Future, which says it is in favour of small business, at the Government Administration Committee actually turned out to be more militant and opposed to private enterprise than the Green Party. It is quite extraordinary—but those members have a number of inconsistencies.

I want to slate the committee for another matter. I refer to clause 119B in Part 1A, “All building work must comply with building code”. When I go to the definitions to find out what “building work” is, I discover in clause 7(1)(b)(ii), to my astonishment, that “a fence as defined in section 2 of the Fencing of Swimming Pools Act 1987;” is a building. Let me declare yet another interest: I own a swimming pool—quite a large one, apparently—in west Auckland, in the eco-city of Waitakere. That gives—[Interruption] The Committee should be aware that this sort of power is going to be delivered to councils. What will they do with it? I will just give members my personal experience. I bought the house, and it had a swimming pool. There was no fence. The Waitakere City Council had done nothing about the Fencing of Swimming Pools Act. I arrived and immediately fenced it. I actually rang up the Waitakere City Council and said: “I know you can’t answer this question, but if you could, who’s a good, reliable fencing contractor?”. The council gave me a name—and of course I would never mention that it did that, so I will not, but it did—and I hired that person. He fenced my pool, and the Waitakere City Council came around on another matter and complimented me on the good job.

Last year I was amazed to get a letter from the Waitakere City Council stating that my pool was not fenced. I looked out to see if the fence had gone and found it was still there. I wrote a note to say that the fence, which the council had complimented me on, was still there. The council came back and said that the pool should not be fenced—it should be caged. I could not believe it. The council told me I had to put the fence right around the edge of the pool to stop children from going in. I said it would mean that we adults would be outside, watching our children drown, and unable to get over the fence to save them.

The council has carried on with this lunacy and is prosecuting 200 swimming pool owners in Waitakere City, each one of whom has a fence. Many of them are in the same situation that I am in, whereby at the other end of my property there is a creek owned by the Waitakere City Council. Is it fenced? No, it is not. I draw to the attention of members the fact that not one child has been drowned in a fenced pool in Waitakere City, but children have most certainly been drowned in creeks.

I say to this Committee that when we pass these sorts of regulations we have to realise that councils have “little Hitlers”—but perhaps I should not call them that.

💬 Opposition Member: Morons?

No, they are worse than morons; they are power mad. They do not like the fact that some people can afford a swimming pool. They want to put up regulations that have nothing to do with safety but are all about power. People like Bob Harvey, the mayor, is completely in the hands of his bureaucrats, and is not able to get up and ask for common sense.

We can see why that is—because the common-sense party, United Future, thinks 10 private building certifiers are responsible for the problems we have had with buildings. There is no evidence to support that. United Future thinks this sort of regulation will make New Zealand a better country—no, it will not. New Zealanders will be tortured as a result of Mr Smith’s contribution. When John Terris introduced the swimming pool legislation he cannot have possibly imagined that responsible owners who had fenced their pools without being asked to by the council would be dragged through the courts and required to cage their pools, which is quite contrary to any intention of this House. Somehow or other the select committee has agreed to declare swimming pools as buildings so that these bureaucrats can persecute ordinary, law-abiding New Zealanders.

I say to the Minister, Mr Tamihere, who says he has had enough of political correctness, that this is political correctness on steroids. The Minister lives in Waitakere City; he knows what an eco-city is like and the nightmare it can be. He knows that it is quite prepared to persecute its own citizens.

I thank Mr Prebble for that fine contribution to the debate. If there is one speech that I have heard this afternoon that has shocked me, it is the speech from United Future. That party has constantly said it stands for common sense. Common sense, my foot! It is absolute political nonsense.

💬 Ron Mark: From a racing driver.

No, it was from the mate of a racing driver. That party said it was for small business; well, it will see business get smaller and smaller under this sort of regulation. In my electorate I have dealt with people from A1 Certifiers—the first building certifiers to be persecuted under the leaky homes situation. Those good business people were driven to the wall because, as soon as the leaky homes situation happened, their insurance company pulled their cover, which meant that A1 Certifiers could not be certified under the former Act—and that situation will be replicated in this bill—and they lost their business. That is a disgrace. They had done nothing wrong other than to have their insurance renewal come up on that particular date.

I am amazed that United Future thinks the leaky homes issue was caused by a few building certifiers. Until the last few years, most of the homes in which I have lived have not had building permits. Mr Catchpole is shocked by that, but the reason is they were built well before building permits were the norm. And not one of them leaked. They were built before we had treated timber, but we did have good-quality native timber, and the people who were using those sorts of products understood that if the house leaked they would be in trouble and would ruin their reputation. This particular bill is supposed to stop leaky homes. It is a sad, sad travesty. We have here a bill that is about an inch thick, and the best thing it can do for a leaky home is to be shoved into the corner of a roof that happens to be leaking. That is about all it can do.

Then there is the cynical attempt to tell building certifiers that if they can get insurance, and can prove that they can afford to pay back the hundreds of thousands of dollars that a leaky home might cost someone, they can be certified. The Government is setting up some rules here that it would not apply to itself. Mr Smith from United Future is a lawyer and knows full well that lawyers do not have to have professional indemnity insurance. He knows that, yet he also knows that lawyers can do a lot more damage to a lot more people in one go than one building certifier can. But Mr Smith is advocating that the building certifiers—these nice, decent, honest people—have stricter and tougher rules placed on them than any lawyer in this country has. That is completely wrong, and Mr Smith should know that. In fact, words come to my mind that cannot be said in this House; “double standard” would certainly be one such phrase. This bill is a cynical and disgraceful attempt. If the Government wants to outlaw ordinary people from being building certifiers—people who have trained, and are qualified and experienced—then it should say that. Mr Smith should not be telling them that they will be called an authority, and that laws will be set up for them that lawyers would not put on themselves. Mr Smith is happy to say he represents a common-sense party that is for small business. Well, it has got it in for small business—that is all I can say.

That party says we should get rid of GST on rates, yet Mr Smith has also said United Future is happy to have ratepayers pick up the bills for everything. It is happy to have councils be certifying authorities. He thinks they will do a better job than registered certifiers. Well, he should have a little think about that, and should think about what it is that councils generally do better than anyone else, and that is pretty much charge people rates that they have no control over, then waste that money on silly services that nobody wants. Most ratepayers would say Mr Smith is not doing them any favours.

I will pick up on the topic of political correctness and point everybody in the direction of clause 26 under Part 2, which is about applications for determinations. A party—I looked up “a party” in the definitions and it does not happen to be there, but I presume it could mean any person—may apply to the chief executive for a determination on any building consent authority’s decision either to issue, or refuse to issue, a building consent. In making that determination, the chief executive has to do a number of things. Some procedures are set out in clause 35, which states: “(1) In making a determination, the chief executive must—(a) avoid unnecessary delay and formality; and (b) recognise tikanga Māori,”. We have a situation where people throughout this country apply for resource consents—sorry, I mean building consents; but this bill is strikingly reminiscent of the Resource Management Act—and, suddenly, under clause 26, the chief executive, in making a determination regarding a building consent, has to recognise tikanga Māori. That is political correctness gone mad, because tikanga Māori means whatever it means to the party wanting the chief executive to make a determination on a building consent. Anyone wanting a building consent in this country will now possibly have to go through the process of a party asking for a determination, and the chief executive, in doing that, has to recognise tikanga Māori. That is an absolute disgrace.

Could we have a response from the Minister in the chair, John Tamihere, as to how he expects that to happen? Every single person wanting to build a home for himself or herself on his or her own property could now be challenged by any party on the basis of tikanga Māori. It is my understanding that “tikanga” means all things visible or invisible in the universe. Please correct me if I am wrong; certainly, the Minister might like to take a call to challenge me on that. It is extraordinary. This type of policy has slid into our legislation in this country, and is causing the sorts of problems we have today. The Minister is allowing it to happen with this bill, and that is an absolute disgrace. I cannot believe he is allowing it to happen. So much for the red-blooded male stuff! So much for all those things that the Minister tends to purport in public! When it comes to putting through law, he has a whole other set of principles and guidelines.

I am disgusted by the fact that if I were to build a house now, I would face the possibility of a party asking for a determination on my building consent, and in the making of that determination tikanga Māori would need to be recognised, and evidence received—written or spoken—in Māori.

💬 Judith Collins: Really?

Absolutely. If members care to bring their attention to clause 35, and if they couple that with clause 26, they will see it there in black and white. National will certainly be making the public of New Zealand aware of those provisions. This Minister, John Tamihere, is allowing those provisions to go through in the Building Bill. It is an absolute disgrace to all New Zealanders.

💬 Hon Member: Very good.

I have not finished. I want to stand up for territorial authorities. This bill tells them that they have to be building consent authorities, whether or not they like it. One needs to read very carefully the sorts of obligations that are placed on local authorities in meeting the requirements of this bill. Those requirements are substantial. The authorities have to keep every single scrap of paper and piece of information, and have to impose a fee or charge for their services. On top of that, they have to collect a levy for the chief executive; that is identified in this bill.

I move, That the question be now put.

I thank Sandra Goudie for drawing members’ attention to clause 35, “Procedure for determination”. She is absolutely correct. Clause 35 states that in making a determination under this legislation—not under a resource consent, or anything like that, but for a building consent: “… the chief executive must—(a) avoid unnecessary delay and formality;”—that seems fair enough—“and (b) recognise tikanga Māori, and receive evidence, written or spoken, in Māori;”.

I guess that Māori is an official language, so that point might be reasonable, but tikanga Māori, in relation to the Building Bill, seems quite extraordinary. As my colleague pointed out, as we have seen from the foreshore and seabed legislation, “tikanga Māori” has an extraordinarily broad definition. It includes things tangible and intangible, and the Minister in the chair, John Tamihere, knows that. The bill now creates enormous uncertainty. Surely the intent of the Government and its handmaiden, United Future, must be to produce some level of certainty for New Zealanders. Surely the intent of abolishing the Building Industry Authority—as bad a decision as that is—and replacing it with the Ministry of Economic Development is to improve New Zealand’s building regulations. That must have been the intent, as bad as it is. Now the Government has this enormous, extraordinary new process of tikanga Māori in this bill. There are places where tikanga Māori has relevance. I think everyone in the Chamber would acknowledge that.

💬 Jill Pettis: Such as a pā.

But how on earth does it relate to determinations by the chief executive in the way—

💬 Hon Richard Prebble: It might help me. Could I declare my swimming pool to be a Māori pā?

That is the sort of thing that could happen. Where we had flawed but at least relatively certain legislation under the 1991 Act, the political correctness of this Government means that it has brought into play concepts that, frankly, have no place in Building Code determinations. I heard the chief Labour whip say: “What about a pā?” That is not the subject of a determination. That is something that a marae committee itself would take into account as it produced its own designs. It has nothing to do with the determination by the chief executive. Determinations relate to general rules that relate to buildings overall—in other words, to the building code, if one likes. So now we have taken something from the private domain—something relating to a particular marae or iwi in relation to their own buildings—and transplanted it into the building code as a general proposition. That is fundamentally wrong.

One thing that National has stood for is equality before the law. We stand very strongly for that, because we believe that on most issues the rules should be the same for everyone and should be understandable. Issues of culture, and so forth, by and large relate to an individual’s or a group’s culture. Culture does not have a specific role or place in economic regulation, which is what the Building Bill is about. Now the Government is importing into the bill cultural concepts. I say to the Minister that that is the reality. The Minister has some understanding of the bicultural world, so I think it is reasonable to us in this Chamber, and around the nation, for the Minister to explain how come this provision is in this economic regulation, and why we would bring these cultural concepts into legislation that is about the general rules relating to buildings. I find that extraordinary.

I take a further call in the Part 2 debate to bring the Minister’s attention to clause 47, “Territorial authority must undertake research”, which states: “A territorial authority must gather any information, and undertake or commission any research, that is necessary for the territorial authority to carry out effectively its functions under this Act.” I say to the Minister that that sounds interesting, but in this country—

💬 Brent Catchpole: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I would like you to consider that the clause the member is mentioning has been struck out.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): I thank the member. The member on his feet may like to consider changing the issue.

I challenge the member to go and look at the page I am looking at in the Building Bill. I have it in front of me, and I am prepared to bring it over and show it to the Chair, or to the Minister, if he likes. But he should have a look at it, and, if he does, he will see that, as I have quoted it, it is still there. It has not been struck out. So I say to the Minister in the chair that he should take a call and explain to members how the 76 local authorities in New Zealand that I know of are to carry that out. In my own electorate, there are seven territorial authorities—seven—and the whole lot will have to go through this process. What cost will that place on those territorial authorities if they have to do what is proposed? The Minister may like to take a call and clarify that for the Committee, because it is certainly a huge compliance cost.

I also say to the Minister that clause 48(1)—and this clause certainly has not been struck out, either; I suggest to members that they look at this—provides that a territorial authority will have to consider any building consent granted under the application. I invite the Minister to take a call and explain why the Minister for Small Business believes that a territorial authority is the only authority in New Zealand that can carry out that function. Once this bill is passed, there are private certifiers out there who will inevitably have to go out of business. It was submitted to the Government Administration Committee that it would be hugely difficult for them to meet the regulation requirements placed on them by this bill. The argument was primarily around insurance. I know that the Minister knows the argument well, but I ask him why he believes that those 11—I do not know the exact figure; I think it is 11—private certifiers in New Zealand are the villains in this process. No evidence at all was submitted to the select committee that any particular private certifier had a record of bad performance, that the leaky house problem came about as a result of their work, or that for some reason they should not be allowed to carry out the work they have always carried out. I ask the Minister to take a call and clear up that point.

I know that the member Murray Smith from United Future had a particular interest in this issue, and he raised it on numerous occasions in the select committee. As members said earlier, he is from a party that campaigned on common sense and that says it stands up for small business, yet it feels the need to run small-business people out of business through heavy-handed regulation. I ask the Minister to take a call and explain to members why that is so. Further, I want the Minister to tell us why he believes that this piece of regulation will fix the problems with the leaky house syndrome. They are known as the four D’s: deflection, which is the ability to deflect or shield water into gutters or other such structures; drainage, which is the ability for water lodged behind cladding to drain back outside; drying, which is the ability for residual moisture to evaporate through ventilation; and durability, which is the ability of materials to stand up to all the conditions they are expected to stand up to in New Zealand, such as untreated timber or treated timber.

Maybe the Minister will explain how he believes that this bill will fix those problems, because nobody else out there knows. Certainly, those who submitted to the select committee had no idea how the bill would do it. They asked why, if there is a problem with building, the Government does not get some builders to look at how to fix it.

I would like to make a number of reflections on a number of the challenges made to the Minister, as follows. As the member for Taranaki-King Country rightly opined, Norm Kirk—great man that he was—did build his own house in the Christchurch area. He did so at a time when men were made of steel and wood with chips. Things have changed. After 10 years of Tory rule, in the implementation and application of the 1991 Building Act, a large number of matters have fallen into disrepair, whether in terms of the capacity and capability of apprenticeships or of standard, certification, processes, and the like. I do not want to rearticulate those. Mr Ardern was on the Government Administration Committee and is aware of the manifest and multifaceted problems that needed to be reviewed and fixed. This bill goes a long way towards doing that.

I want to also acknowledge one of our great Prime Ministers, and, in doing so, say that the only difficulty we have with his great prime ministership is that he was a member of the National Party. But what he did say, which I thought was marvellous, in terms of the principles that the great National Party used to stand for, was: “Never forget that we are a property-owning democracy.” The nub of this bill goes to protecting the Kiwi battlers out there who are making one of the most significant investment decisions in their lives. They need to be protected from the rorts that were occurring, and that will continue to occur, with regard to the building industry.

A number of other matters were raised by members about the powers of the chief executive officer, and the like. Somebody will have to conduct the bringing together—and have the discretion with regard to a number of the authorities and powers—of four or five agencies to form a new department of building and construction. I commend those authorities and delegations that have been provided to the chief executive officer.

💬 Dr Wayne Mapp: What about the tikanga Māori issue?

I want to conclude—as challenged by Dr Wayne Mapp—on the issue of tikanga Māori. There are 66 million square acres of land in this country—I will use acres, because those are the land measurements I think in—and over 3 million square acres is Māori Land Court title. It is different title—absolutely—to the general title system. In the MacIntyre amendment of 1967-74, Māori-owned land owned by four, or fewer, owners was transferred arbitrarily, mandatorily, and without notice into general land holdings. So there are also tens of thousands of acres of general land held by Māori under Māori Land Court jurisdiction. The application of this law must apply to that land block, as well. So in the first instance, I say to members opposite that, instead of turning this into a race issue, they should acknowledge that this Parliament legislated different laws. At one time all land was Māori land, save for the land that was confiscated, and we are having a debate about that. The issue, therefore, is not about whether there are separate rights available in this country; it is about Parliament having decreed that different rights are applicable to different levels of land tenure. That is the first point I wanted to make.

I want to conclude on the tikanga Māori issue by stating quite carefully and clearly that it is as in the United States: where there are sacrosanct pieces of land where tens of thousands of US citizens lost their lives in the Civil War, Americans uphold that land and protect it. It is iconic heritage land. It is great history, nation-building land, and it is right that, in the Māori world view of tikanga, certain things are supported. So I indicate quite carefully and clearly, that different rights have been applied by this Parliament with regard to Māori land tenure. It is large, it is there, we cannot deny it, and we must make laws that acknowledge it. It is about time that people started to move on. I commend the bill accordingly.

I want to pick up on a point that Richard Prebble made about swimming pools. I had a similar experience with a spa pool that was outside and was required to be fenced. I never used the spa pool, because it leaked. So it never had any water in it, but I still had to have it fenced. Right across the paddock, just 25 metres away from my gate was—guess what—a big trough that had been dug into the ground. It had been used for dairy farming, but because the owners had sheep now, they had dug it into the ground so that the sheep could drink out of it. So that situation was absolutely ludicrous. It was OK to have a trough in a paddock, but my spa pool—which I was not using because it had a leak in it—had to be fenced.

I draw the Committee’s attention back to the issue of private certifiers, the question of liability, and the problems they have with insurance. The members of the Government Administration Committee visited Australia a month ago, and it was interesting to see what the situation is in Australia in terms of private certifiers. Over there, they have proportionate liability. I think that that is significant in terms of their cover and the liability they are exposed to, as opposed to the joint and several liability that is the requirement in this legislation. But there are also a number of insurance companies that are prepared to work with the private certifiers in Australia. They are CGU Insurance, Royal and SunAlliance, and QBE Insurance. They are an established part of the building scene. In fact, it was interesting to note that the state of Victoria, the Northern Territory, and ACT have only private certifiers, so they are an established part of the building scene in those three areas. In New South Wales, South Australia, and Queensland, the territorial local authorities also have private certifiers. It is Western Australia only that does not have private certifiers. The local authorities do the inspection work there.

National’s issue is with the huge costs associated with the question of who carries the can at the end of the day. Under the provisions of the bill, the building consent authorities—the certifiers in councils—will be the parties holding the liability. Why is some of the responsibility not devolved down to the architects, the engineers, the builders, the developers, and the other sub-trades involved? At the moment, the backstop will be the territorial local authorities and the private certifiers. The Government says this bill is about consumer protection, but we say that there is no consumer protection at all in it. The reality is that the consumer will have a backstop through local authority rates, if the local authority has to pick up the costs of all those other areas. So that is the area we have major concern about. As I said, in Australia the insurance is proportional liability, but here it is joint and several liability for the entire construction process. That is the major difference. It is our area of concern, and it is certainly a concern of private certifiers.

The second area I want to draw the Committee’s attention to is clause 23, “Chief executive must consult in performing certain functions”, which gives the chief executive huge powers. As the Minister said, it will take some time to set up the new administration.

I move, That the question be now put.