Building Amendment Bill (No 4)

I move, That the Building Amendment Bill (No 4) be now read a third time. We have just been through the Committee of the whole House stage of the Building Amendment Bill (No 4), and I was asked by one of the speakers to put a bit more time into what is in the bill. I do not intend to take a long time going through the bill, but I do want to say that the most important ingredient in this bill makes it mandatory for a builder to provide a written contract for any work if it is over $20,000. So it is not mandatory if you are getting your kitchen cupboards redone or you are getting a door to the laundry changed, and so on, but it is mandatory for any work that is more than slightly trivial.

There are some really important ingredients. First of all, the builder must provide to the consumer a checklist of what information is available to the client, including their rights and their obligations under the building work process, so that the consumer becomes well-informed. They need to disclose to the client information about their skills, their work history, and their business. They need to show to the consumer: “This is what I am, in terms of a skilled, qualified practitioner. This is the history of my work programme”—which the client can go and look at—“and this is what my business is structured like.”, in terms of whether it might fold because it is so delicate. That is, I think, vitally important to the consumer. Finally, the builder has to enter into an absolutely written contract so that it is actually watertight.

I thank the House for processing this through, but I think it is worthwhile covering just a couple of points, especially the points raised by Metiria Turei from the Green Party about National’s deregulation of the building sector. These points that I want to make now are not to try to play silly games or anything; they are just straight factual. The Building Bill of 1991 was introduced into Parliament by Labour, by the Hon Margaret Austin. She introduced it in 1990 because Labour thought that the whole building sector needed dramatic reform, and, to be absolutely honest, National agreed with that. So when we became the Government in 1990 we finished off the bill by passing it through its third reading and making it become an Act. But it was not ours to start with.

In fact, I have got some wonderful quotes from George Hawkins when he became the Minister later on, saying: “National, don’t dare claim credit for that Act. That was ours. Yes, it might have been passed when National was in Government, but it was our bill, which Margaret Austin introduced, and Labour deserves the credit for it.” So be very careful about accusing National of being the deregulating Government that changed the legislation in 1991. We did not introduce that bill. We did not put it through its first few stages, including through the select committee. We gave it its third reading only because we agreed with it. So it was a Labour Act.

The second thing that I think is worthwhile covering is that the key cause for our leaky homes syndrome was not anything to do with this Parliament, it was not anything to do with a Minister, and it was not anything to do with a member of Parliament or anything else. There was an independent agency—completely independent of Ministers and this Parliament—called Standards New Zealand. It was Standards New Zealand, after a lot of advocacy from the big timber companies Fletcher’s and Carters saying that treated timber had all sorts of arsenics, carcinogens, and all sorts of ghastly stuff that could leech into the builders’ skin, and so on, and that we did not need to use it any more. Interestingly, if you read the report—because I have read it with great interest—it said that borer was no longer an issue. That is why we had mainly treated timber, up until 1995, for borer. So Standards New Zealand—and not any Minister in any Government or any select committee or any member of Parliament was involved in it—decided to allow kiln-dried timber as an acceptable solution under the Building Act.

In hindsight, that proved to be a huge mistake, and the country is paying billions. PricewaterhouseCoopers has estimated it to be $11.2 billion already, and it could be double that. So be very careful of laying the blame on any political party, and be very careful of laying the blame on any Minister, for the decision to go to untreated timber. It was no Minister, even if at the time they had known it—I do not know who the Minister was in 1995, but I do not think they would have even known that it was an issue, because Standards New Zealand just did it independently and announced that decision.

Then, finally, Andrew Williams said that he does not like the idea of risk-based consenting—that is, things that are at the very low end of the risk curve. These are things that are using stock standard products, using stock standard design, treated timber, three-bedroom—he does not like the idea of that having a lot less scrutiny than something that is at the high end of the risk curve. Well, I say to Mr Williams that we used to have the full scrutiny, the 18 inspections, the building consent process, and the actual code of compliance on all those buildings. And did that give consumers protection? Did that save them from the disasters that they have had? So why he would be advocating that we need to stay with the full set of consents and inspections, and the code of compliance when it did not give thousands of consumers the protection—why would you then say: “Well, that’s what we should stay with.”?

💬 Andrew Williams: Of course it gave protection.

It did not give them protection, and if he thinks it did, there are tens of thousands of people out there now who are dramatically out of pocket and hurt by it.

The whole purpose of it—and this was the whole direction of the review—was to say: “Why don’t we look at things that are at the low end of the risk curve? Why don’t we look at things that are almost a guarantee not to be an issue?”. And we have already done it with a thing called MultiProof, where we have said to people: “Come and get your consent for the building once and only once, and then when you go out and build multiple copies of it around the country, you don’t need to keep going to the local authority for each individual version of that building.”, which is a good move.

But I also say to them that what we have got now—and it is another thing I do not think Andrew Williams is giving any credit for—as of March last year, is the licensed building practitioners scheme. What that says now is that if you are going to build a house and be involved in either the structural integrity or the weathertight envelope of that building, you actually have to be a qualified practitioner. You have to have been through a whole series of processes to evaluate your skills, your talents, and your qualifications, and you then become a licensed practitioner. Up until March of last year all you needed to do to build a house was to have a cellphone, a dog, and a ute. Anyone—anyone—could have gone and built a house up until March of last year. No longer can you do that. You now have to be a qualified person or be supervised by a qualified person. So why would we then say to a qualified practitioner: “The regime is like it is. You’re qualified. We don’t need all the scrutiny, but in fact we still think we should have bureaucrats pour over you for something quite so simple.”

In the end, I thank some of the Labour members for their words. I know they have not thought that the bill goes far enough, and let me say that I think I agree with them. But it is better that we make some incremental improvements as time rolls by than try to find a way of solving all of the problems in one hit. I would really hope that we get the Law Commission to give a report about moving away from joint and several and moving to a proportionate level. So I am really happy to move that the Building Amendment Bill (No 4) be now read a third time.

As Shane Jones said, the Minister for Building and Construction heads up a unique alumni of Ministers for Building and Construction both present and past, along with Mr Jones and myself and the Minister, Mr Williamson. I cannot recall—I am sure Mr Williamson might—when we were in Government, how many Ministers for Building and Construction there were. There were a few, and I have to say from the outset that the intent, I think, of all those Ministers, from both sides, was to try to solve a series of difficult problems, and particularly, as the Minister says, the weathertight homes issue, which was visited on us for a variety of reasons.

I accept the Minister’s thesis, in part, that it was for a variety of reasons and a variety of contributing factors. I would, though, mention one, as it sort of latticed together those factors, and that was that in the old days—possibly well before some of us were here—we had things called apprenticeships. We had a building regime that generally—and many of our State houses are living testaments to it. You could fire a howitzer at some of them, and though they were built pre-insulation and though they are bit draughty, they still stand up to most things today. But many of our houses throughout our history were build on a handshake, and builders and construction folk came back if there was a problem and fixed it. They were constructed well and those builders were trained in a thing called an apprenticeship.

Before I entered this Parliament—and I remember as Minister making a couple of points to the then Hon Dr Lockwood Smith, who at the time—I think it was 19—

💬 Kris Faafoi: Right honourable.

Right honourable. I was going to say Sir, but I presume that is yet to come.

💬 Hon Maurice Williamson: No, no, no—it is Sir Lockwood.

Oh, he is Sir. That is right—of course. I apologise. The Rt Hon Sir Dr Lockwood Smith—I hope I have got it, and honourable somewhere in there—

💬 Hon Maurice Williamson: School C.

Yeah—bistro and bar. But he—I think it was in 1995—as tertiary education Minister, abolished a thing called the Apprenticeship Act in the vain hope that the market would sort it out, and people would go and get the skills, and those sorts of things. I recall when I originally, and Shane Jones, took and launched the licensed building practitioners regime. The hope I think we had, once we transitioned those builders who had appropriate skill levels, who may not have had the trade certificate or an apprenticeship but did have a very good track record of building—once they were sort of through it—was that we could almost turn the clock back and say to the 15-year-old at high school: “Son, if you want to be a builder, you have to get a thing called an apprenticeship.”. That is why we introduced the Modern Apprenticeships scheme. The Minister is right, in that you could strap on a tool belt, call yourself a builder, and do anything. But I think that was a contributing factor. In the old days people were trained through a 3 to 4-year apprenticeship, and they knew what they were doing.

Though we support the review process in respect of the Building Act, we find ourselves, on this side of the House, unable to support the Building Amendment Bill (No 4). I say to the Minister—he made a couple of comments to Andrew Williams, I think it was, and said: “Well, we had 18 inspections. We had council inspectors running around the place. Take weathertight building homes—they did not get it right, and we still have the problem.” I have got to say that I agree with the Minister to a certain extent, because I remember going to a number of local authorities as Minister for Building and Construction and actually talking to some of the building inspectors, and on one occasion they said: “Oh, we stopped the ‘drive-by inspections’ only a couple of years ago.” I said: “What do you mean ‘drive-by’?”. They said: “Well, to be honest, the pressure was on us so much that we just sort of drove by, waved at the building, and then signed it off.”

To be fair, though, the answer, in my view—contrary to the Minister’s—is that less scrutiny does not reduce the risk. What I think should have happened, and what we did do, was that we started to accredit councils to make sure that building inspectors actually had the knowledge. There is the old joke that, you know, the building inspector is the failed builder—not always. But to ensure that building inspectors and local authorities had the skills to actually inspect and check, and if it was not up to scratch, to then require change—and not drive by the house and go, “Yep. It is all done.”, and never even look, because it might have been their mates, or they were under pressure, or they did not have the resources—we started the accreditation of councils.

I do not agree with the Minister that less inspection, less scrutiny, means less risk. Appropriate scrutiny by trained people who actually do the damn job can actually mean less risk. It used to be—again, going back many years—that the last line of defence for the homeowner was the building inspector from the council who would come in and make sure the bits joined together, and tick off those items.

I suppose the thing that concerns us is that this bill seems to be a sort of piecemeal approach. I agree with the sentiment of the Minister, which says that in theory low risk means we should be able to get on with it without a lot of bureaucracy—if you want to build the outhouse outside, well, OK, maybe. But I still do not really get from the Minister—and I still think the definition of what is low risk is too loose and has not been adequately defined. You could make an argument that fitting your hot-water cylinder is pretty standard, pretty low risk. Well, if she blows, it causes a heck of a lot of damage. So it is very easy, and, I think, very politically popular, to say: “Look, low risk, we’re just going to flick it through, with minimal scrutiny. It’s not going to affect the envelope of the house; it doesn’t matter. Just away you go and do it.”

I think there needs to be a more holistic approach to this—a far more holistic approach—where all these facets are looked at. I say again that I do not understand the logic that less inspection means less risk. Appropriate levels of inspection by skilled and appropriate inspectors or professionals who can call to account the person who has constructed or done the work—and make them fix it or do it appropriately—generally means a higher degree of confidence for the homeowner.

So I say, in concluding, that although I accept that every Minister for Building and Construction has from time to time—often under duress from the odd chief executive officer or senior official, I might add; some no longer with us—had the best intentions to try to get this right, I do not think that this bill is the way to go. There should be more scrutiny and there should be an overarching regime, not a piecemeal sort of uncoordinated approach.

We will not support this bill. We support the sentiment, and we look forward to the day when the Government will take this issue a tad more seriously. The truth is that, as we all know—and as has certainly been brought home to us by Christchurch and Canterbury, but for a natural reason, if you will, called an earthquake—the biggest asset people have generally, or the biggest transaction people will have in their lives, is the purchase of a home. If there is anything good to come out of the leaky homes fiasco and even, sadly, the earthquake in terms of home scrutiny, I think it is this. Those of us who purchase property or who look to purchase property understand that we are just like most people when they buy a second-hand car, take it to the Automobile Association, and say: “Is it a dunger or is it not? Is it OK? Is it worth the money?”. We had this mind block that we would not do that with a house, but most people now—and it is germane to today’s Christchurch Press, actually—will have a professional look at the home very closely. They will check the work to ensure that the asset they buy, with the hundreds of thousands of dollars that they outlay of their own money, is well worth it and that they are not buying a dunger—not buying a dunger.

I finish on this. If you look at construction—I just digress for a short point, and that is that if we look at the Fletcher Construction project management in Christchurch, the legalised monopoly, it is astounding that with the accreditation system and other things in place, we find that one in three house repairs executed by Fletcher EQR is a dunger—is a dunger. I think that even with all that, and even with the monopoly and the regime that the Government set up, to have those figures—one in three a dunger—is not acceptable, especially to those who have had their lives torn apart by an earthquake.

I rise to support the Building Amendment Bill (No 4), which has gone through a tremendous amount of scrutiny since the review of the Building Act carried out in roughly 2009, flowing on to 2010. It is worth noting that the construction sector is a critical player in the New Zealand economy. It is the fifth-largest sector in New Zealand. It employs 174,000 people, which equates to somewhere roughly between 7 and 9 percent of the workforce overall. It contributes to about 4 percent of the GDP. It employs large numbers of Māori and lots of those, of course, leaving school and looking to upgrade their skills in that very sector.

It is not surprising that in a sector employing so many working so hard in this country and contributing so much to our GDP there would be a few, if you like, cowboys out there. The idea of this legislation is to reform the building rules such that they “build it right first time”. New Zealand, in some senses, in some parts of the country, and with some building companies, has been seen as something of a wild west historically, and, of course, that must stop, because although we talk about the very high-level figures for New Zealand, the reality is that if it was just one home that was built in New Zealand by one builder contributing very little to the GDP, to that particular family it is a complete tragedy if their largest and most valuable asset actually crumbles underneath them and they are left, essentially, with big bills to pay on top of a mortgage.

This legislation will ensure that homeowners can make informed decisions about their homes and who builds their homes. Improvements to productivity, efficiency, and accountability can be achieved only if building work is designed and constructed right the first time and meets the requirements of the building code. The review did find an over-reliance on building consent authorities. It is important that we do have the monitoring, the policing, and, of course, the accountability that comes from that. The reality is that we want to trust the builder in the first place to give good advice and do an excellent job on site.

The changes will enforce in law what is already best practice in the industry. The majority of builders, who have already behaved professionally, have nothing to fear whatsoever, but the cowboys do, and that is a good thing. I am sure that this House agrees. The major change is that homeowners will be better able to identify between a professional and those who are lax in their work. And, of course, the drawing up of contracts and the obligations on builders to provide some sort of transparency about their business and what they are going to give, I guess, to their clients have been fully opened up. I commend this bill to the House. It has taken a long period of work by this Parliament and the Minister to pay attention to detail. I congratulate the Local Government and Environment Committee on its work, and I commend the bill to Parliament.

Labour supports the Building Act review, and our focus is on the protection of consumers, building practitioners, and building consenting authorities—namely, ratepayers. For that reason we cannot, at least at this stage, support the passage of the Building Amendment Bill (No 4). We look forward to supporting any new bills that provide such protection.

Two events, as explained in my earlier contributions, would have played a certain role in affecting our position. It would make more sense to focus specifically on issues in relation to dams and hold back the provisions that deal with the consumer issues in relation to residential properties. The second one is concerning the review of the non-ductile column buildings built between 1982 and 1995 with three storeys or more. The purpose was to establish whether there were any buildings with design flaws similar to those of the CTV Building, which collapsed in the February 2011 Christchurch earthquake, killing 115 people.

The current legal regime does not give authorities the power to compel owners of at-risk buildings to have their at-risk buildings assessed in the interests of public safety. The Minister for Building and Construction had earlier indicated that he would explore options to address the issue by introducing, for instance, a Supplementary Order Paper to this bill, but neither of the two events occurred in terms of the progress of this bill, and therefore our opposition, as outlined in our minority report, has remained the same. It is more in sorrow than in anger that we have no other choice but to vote against this bill.

There are a number of issues I wish to bring to the attention of this House—firstly, the definition of buildings. The Building Act, as its title suggests, is meant to cover all the infrastructure, commercial and industrial buildings, and structures. However, one major problem with the drafting of both the Building Amendment Bill (No 3), the Building Amendment Bill (No 4), and, indeed, the entire Building Act review is their obsession with homes, dwelling units. It appears that they have confined the definition of buildings to that of homes, dwelling units, or residential buildings.

Given the very serious problems that have come to light with large structures, especially stadiums, the Building Act review and the two bills introduced to implement its policy decisions should have covered more than dams and dwelling units. The Supreme Court’s decision on the Spencer on Byron Hotel case has reinforced the view that the Building Act review and the bills introduced should be taking a wider look at those issues. It is therefore important to note that we are dealing with only part of what the Building Act is meant to cover, and, further, that the Building Amendment Bill (No 4) addresses only residential buildings and, oddly, dams.

Secondly, we find the rationale to replace code compliance certificates with consent completion certificates less convincing. We agree with the submissions and the views that, until such time as the licensed building practitioner regime matures, this is a step too far. According to them, at this stage the regime is more a system of ticking boxes than a means to upskill the industry. The new consent completion certificate is significantly different from the old code compliance certificate, and this change will almost certainly have a detrimental effect on consumers seeking redress for severe loss. I note the Minister has not triggered the new consent completion certificate regime, for good reasons, and that has reinforced my view.

Thirdly, contrary to the purpose of this bill, the measures introduced would reduce the means by which an aggrieved owner can seek redress for significant financial loss and hardship. One overarching concern from the submitters is that this bill sought to redistribute the responsibility and liability of the building consent authorities, and therefore intended to ring-fence them, in the event of building failures. We agree that the liability that has, until now, rested with the consenting authorities, as the last man standing, is unacceptable. This is because ratepayers have had to eventually bear the cost of negligence claims brought against the consenting authorities. It is equally unacceptable that it is now the consumers, who will be left to pick up most of the bill for any claims resulting from substandard building work. Further, no measures have been taken to ensure that builders and other parties who may be responsible for serious defects have sufficient assets and insurance to cover their liabilities. That is the reason why this afternoon I released the Labour media statement, urging the Government to include the home warranty insurance scheme in the Building Act review.

I support two of our largest city councils—the Wellington City Council and the Christchurch City Council—and a number of other submitters who have called upon the Government to introduce a home warranty insurance scheme. As pointed out by the Home Owners and Buyers Association of New Zealand, if responsible parties for defective building work have gone out of business, died, or left the country, the consumer is left exposed and faces having to cover the costs. The building law should be amended to offer greater protections, not reduce them.

I turn to the fourth point, with regard to company failures. Concerns were expressed about companies that are formed for the sole purpose of a single building project and are then liquidated as soon as the work is completed, leaving no legal entity that can be directly held to account for defective work that is later discovered. As it stands, the bill fails to offer consumers any effective remedies when left in the lurch by a $1 shell company, despite the fact that the building sector’s failure rate is higher than the rate of all businesses before 2003 and after 2008. Even legitimate contracting and subcontracting firms have often ceased to exist by the time defects have come to light.

Fifthly—a product’s warranty—we welcome the introduction of a responsibility provision for product manufacturers or suppliers. It is widely accepted that the leaky buildings saga was primarily caused by the use of inappropriate building products or systems, or incompetence in, or lack of adequate oversight of, their application. The Minister pointed his finger at Standards New Zealand and he must be correct, given he is so experienced. However, given the complexity of the issue, particularly where the prescribed compliance with the building code is often difficult to establish, the provision in its current form fails to address the problem adequately. In addition, it is essential that building product manufacturers do not escape liability because the specified installation requirements are impractical. All materials must be able to be installed on site, using good carpentry, joinery, plastering, or similar trade skills, to reasonable tolerances and without the demand for laboratory-type conditions.

Lastly, there are also drafting issues in terms of how the provisions in this bill will be implemented. Many provisions in this bill are yet to be prescribed or determined by regulation, and without proper definition it is difficult to put the clauses into context, which hinders the interpretation and implementation of the Act. There are other deficiencies in this bill—for example, the practicality of prescribing—

I am sorry to interrupt the honourable member, but his time has expired.

I rise to take a short call on the Building Amendment Bill (No 4). The Green Party opposes this bill. We are not against the general premise behind the bill and the aims of it—the consumer protection aspects—and we look forward to a much better bill in the future that will address those issues.

The bill has brought up some things for me, from when I was an owner-builder. I have watched from the side because it is not the area that I normally work in, but I have noticed the flip-flops through the building regulations and also through the materials aspect. The Minister for Building and Construction mentioned earlier what has gone. We had gone to kiln-dried. We had had the chemical issue, and we have gone back to that. I wanted to use, as you might expect, fairly natural products. I wanted to use naturally resilient timbers and the like, and then some of those got ruled out, I would say, by the industry groups that somehow managed to organise that we had a Pinus radiata - focused industry, which clearly led us into trouble later on.

I am looking forward to when we get into ensuring that there are consumer protections. We can have a really good relook at the same time at the materials that are allowed in building and the style of construction. I have got friends who are fairly creative in their building styles, and, of course, some of the regulations, some of the legislation that we look for, can actually constrain that. I think that the building law needs to have a fairly wide provision, and in a way, in some aspects, this bill may allow for that.

Underlying all of that, regardless of the bill’s breadth and its creativity, it has got to have a strong consumer protection part. That is just inadequate in this bill. It might be that the liabilities that are not adequately covered in this bill—that may be difficult for some creative home building—need to be addressed through future legislation. I look forward to that at some time. I find it appalling that at the moment in New Zealand so much is based around the Fletcher’s-type products and the Hardie’s-type products—the sheet sizes and everything—to suit a vested interest, rather than maybe around what could really happen from a localised building and timber industry.

We are importing as well, at the moment, through the free-trade agreements, Chilean plywood that does not even meet the standard—it is going up. There is not enough work being done around that. I ask the Minister whether it going to be addressed by this bill. Are we going to deal with the fact that we are allowing it? We have got a massive timber industry, and wood processors are going to the wall, and yet we are importing—because of being open to competition, it appears—Chilean timber into New Zealand and Australian timber into New Zealand, when we already have the same species. If there is something unique and beneficial for New Zealanders, for New Zealand home builders, and there is other construction that cannot be done here, you might say fine, let us look at that. But to be opening up our borders, allowing rubbish material to come in, and pushing our own timber processes out is concerning.

I am looking forward to a better bill. The Green Party was supportive of this bill through to the Local Government and Environment Committee. We seriously wanted to hear what the options were and what the possibilities were. There are some good aspects in the bill, but, obviously, we have spotted the things that are not adequate. We want better consumer protection and we will be opposing this bill. Thank you.

The Building Amendment Bill (No 4) has a number of important provisions in it that will be beneficial to the building industry and, most important, to those New Zealanders who are contemplating building, or building, their home.

💬 Raymond Huo: Be a bit more passionate!

The member opposite says “Be more passionate about it.” Well, actually, we are, and that is why Maurice Williamson has brought this bill to the House and why the Local Government and Environment Committee has worked—

💬 Hon Maurice Williamson: There is no more passionate member than Maurice Williamson.

There is, clearly, no more passionate Minister than Maurice, but this is a good bill, because it makes some pretty sensible changes to the Building Act. It reduces compliance costs. Who has not heard of a call to reduce compliance costs? Compliance costs for the sake of compliance costs—they are going. It reduces complexity and reduces delays by reducing reliance on building consent authorities. That is good news, whatever way you look at it. It will make building contractors more accountable by requiring that they disclose information, and that disclosure will contain information about the legal status of the contractor—whether they are operating under a limited liability company or not. They will have to disclose the people who will carry out the work and their track record—their work history, dispute history, skills, and qualifications—and what, if any, financial back-up or insurance they have to cover the cost of fixing any faults, should they be found.

Other provisions in this excellent bill protect consumers by requiring written contracts for most residential building work, and information in a contract could include the parties to the contract and the dispute resolution—how they are going to get around anything if there is a dispute. There are a number of aspects to this bill that do nothing but improve the safety of building work for New Zealanders, and I commend the bill to the House.

I take a call on behalf of New Zealand First in the third reading of the Building Amendment Bill (No 4). Was it not interesting listening to the speech of the Minister for Building and Construction, Maurice Williamson, defending the indefensible of the 1990s and the leaky building situation that we now have in this country? The Minister said: “Oh, nothing to do with us, nothing to do with the Government, nothing to do with the Minister—that was Standards New Zealand’s problem, not ours.” He omitted to mention that Standards New Zealand is a Crown entity—it is a Crown entity.

💬 Hon Maurice Williamson: Independent.

It is autonomous, but it is still a Crown entity. It has three out of its seven board members appointed by the Minister of Commerce, Minister. Three of the seven board members are ministerial appointments. It does have accountability. The current chair was announced by Minister of Commerce Simon Power, when he was a Minister. The Crown does have oversight of that entity in terms of what it sets.

Certainly, Minister, back in the 1990s under the National watch—and, sure, it may have inherited the building legislation review in 1991 from the former Labour Government, but your Government in the 1990s allowed it to continue to pass into law. That saw, as a result, reduced standards in the 1990s, which then saw Standards New Zealand allowing reduced standards in the building code, which then saw materials such as kiln-dried timber and monolithic cladding being used, which then saw $30 billion and rising of New Zealand property ending up in leaky building situations. The Minister has said: “Well, we should also just blame that on Carters and Fletcher’s, which convinced Standards New Zealand to allow the kiln-dried timber.” Well, that is all very well, Minister, but what are you now doing about that situation?

The Ministry of Education this year announced it has $1.5 billion worth of leaky schools throughout New Zealand—many hundreds of leaky schools throughout New Zealand. It has entered into a court case against James Hardie Industries about monolithic cladding throughout New Zealand schools. But the Minister mentioned tonight that Carters and Fletcher’s provided the kiln-dried timber. Well, Minister, what are you doing about chasing Carters and Fletcher’s to get some payback on all that kiln-dried timber that is now rotting in the schools of New Zealand, rotting in the hospitals of New Zealand, rotting in the public buildings of New Zealand, rotting in the defence and other ministry buildings of New Zealand, and rotting in the homes of good, average New Zealand Kiwis, whose houses are rotting around them? What are you doing, Minister, about chasing the likes of Carters and Fletcher’s, which you stated tonight were responsible for it? You are doing nothing.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): I am not doing nothing.

Oh, no, no, sorry. The Minister is doing nothing. The Minister is doing nothing. It is all very well to point the finger at Carters and Fletcher’s. Minister, please go and chase those people and hold them to account for the $30 billion or $40 billion or $50 billion, perhaps, that it is going to end up costing for leaky buildings right across New Zealand’s commercial, public, and private sectors.

I will carry on with this particular bill and why New Zealand First is not supporting it. You can drive a bus through half of this. For instance, under the exemptions it says that demolition of a detached building is maybe permitted. The complete demolition of a building that is detached and is not more than three storeys does not require a consent; you can just knock it down. The member for North Shore sitting over there might be asked this question in her electorate of the North Shore—I wonder what the people in Devonport, who have a particular affinity to heritage, might be thinking when—

💬 Hon Clayton Cosgrove: She’s a fossil!

Well, no, not that heritage; I am thinking of younger heritage than that member. What will the people of Devonport be thinking when, for instance, under this bill demolition of a building under three storeys is permitted with no problems at all? So, basically, in Devonport a heritage building—it could be an outhouse or something, or an old stable; it could be a lovely historic building that currently must have a consent from the local authority to be demolished—could be pulled down. Imagine the impact on heritage buildings throughout New Zealand as a result of that, when people can basically just say: “Oh, we don’t need that particular building out there any more. Let’s just pull it down.” Under the current situation, if it has heritage value, it will be covered.

When you look at all the other exemptions, which include porches and verandas, carports, retaining walls, fences and hoardings, decks, platforms, bridges, and boardwalks not exceeding 1.5 metres—all sorts of things where there are structures. Again, you get back to situations where—we all remember what happened at Cave Creek with the collapse of that particular deck. It was shown, in that very sad situation, that inadequate skills and materials had been used in terms of that particular deck construction. But in this situation where, basically, so many of these things—and this is including exemptions for alterations to non-residential buildings such as shops, offices, libraries, factories, warehouses, churches, or schools. So schools are also now exempt from such building work, because they are categorised alongside offices, libraries, and other things.

Again, do we have a situation where some alterations are done in a school and they say: “Well, this was a school that didn’t need a consent. We didn’t have to go to the local authority to check whether it was permitted.”? It is done and then something happens in that school and they say: “Gosh, how on earth did the legislation go through that exempted schools from requiring consents of this order?”.

Marquees and tents of 100 square metres will not require anything from any authority. They can be put up—100-square-metre marquees or tents. Those are major structures, and I know from having been involved in many community events that some of those marquees are very, very significant. When they are put up—and they are often put up in perilous situations, on sloping areas, for public events and all that sort of thing—they certainly do need and require the scrutiny of an independent authority at times to check that they have been constructed in the right manner. Are we going to have a situation again where a large marquee—a 100-square-metre marquee—is put up by just any old Joe Bloggs without any independent authority checking that it has been put up adequately? And then we find a large number of people gathered at an event, whether it is a wedding function or some other public gathering, and then we find that the structure fails.

This bill is all about providing loopholes and exemptions and lowering the standards in New Zealand. We do want to reduce costs to consumers in New Zealand, of course. We do want to reduce expense to consumers and the public of New Zealand, but not at the expense of the safety of those structures. It is very regrettable that, really, if this bill was properly and independently analysed—it is opening up a huge can of worms for future potential risk to New Zealanders. It is opening up a situation where shonky jerry-builders can, for instance, be fined $2,000 if they commit an offence in terms of the prescribed disclosure information and checklist—a $2,000 fine. Or, if they commit an offence under subsection (3), it is up to a $20,000 fine. Well, is that not ridiculous? Those could be large, large constructions. The builders do not do it. They provide some sort of shonky-looking certificate that makes out that they are legitimate. They are self-regulating. They are not controlled by any authority in terms of what they are doing, and then they are subject to only a $20,000 fine if they are caught out. Again, this is opening up a situation of cowboy building in New Zealand, cowboy controls in New Zealand, and self-regulation where it will basically be a free-for-all.

The National Government will rue the day that in 2013 it brought in this bill—as it did the leaky homes in the 1990s. It will be leaky homes and leaky buildings revisited.