Weathertight Homes Resolution Services Amendment Bill

on behalf of the Minister for Building and Housing: I move, That the Weathertight Homes Resolution Services Amendment Bill be now read a second time. I would like to take this opportunity to thank my colleague Scott Simpson for his work in chairing the Local Government and Environment Committee, and, of course, the rest of the committee members for their consideration of this very important bill. I believe they have brought some well-thought-out recommendations back to the House that, I think, will improve the overall clarity of this bill. I am proud to commend this bill and the select committee’s amendments to the House.

I would like to briefly reiterate the key changes proposed by this bill. The bill is a package of three important areas of change to make sure that the options available to homeowners under the Weathertight Homes Resolution Services Act continue to work effectively. In particular, the bill amends some of the provisions around the Financial Assistance Package under the Act, which focuses on getting leaky homes repaired. Instead of homeowners having to go down the track of litigation, they can apply for funding from the Government to contribute to the overall repair costs. Two of the main changes are aimed at clarifying the way that eligibility under the Act is interpreted, firstly so that there is no doubt about the validity of some of the criteria that homeowners have to meet to qualify for the Financial Assistance Package. The bill lifts some of the contribution criteria out of a Gazette notice and puts them into the Act. It is crucial that these two criteria work to ensure that territorial authorities continue to participate in the Financial Assistance Package.

Another main area of change in the bill is deeming some people eligible if they had previously had claims held to be ineligible under the Act because of the way that courts and tribunals have interpreted the 10-year period from the date that a house was indeed built. These amendments mean that around 70 homeowners who might have had eligible claims if their cases had been decided using the interpretation that the Supreme Court used in its decision in Osborne v Auckland Council will have their claims deemed eligible. If they meet the other eligibility criteria in the Act, those people can access the Dispute Resolution Services and the Financial Assistance Package under the Act.

Finally, the bill makes some changes to the expiry of the Financial Assistance Package. Under the Act, claimants need to have issued a notice to proceed by 23 July 2016. There are several steps required before a person can issue a notice to proceed, and it can take varying amounts of time depending on the circumstances of the claim. So the bill includes a provision to enable people who are actively working their way through the process to be able to continue with their claim after 23 July 2016, and not be locked out of this process.

The select committee got some very helpful submissions that raised issues about whether some of the drafting was sufficiently clear for claimants and territorial authorities. Particular areas of concern were around the exact requirements for Financial Assistance Package claimants to meet the contribution criteria once they moved into the Act, and also the potential for confusion arising from the various dates that code compliance certificates can be issued. I would like to thank the people and organisations who took the time to make very important submissions and express their views in front of the select committee. The select committee has recommended a number of improvements and clarifications to the drafting, which I believe will address the concerns that were raised and better achieve the Government’s policy intent.

I would also like to take an opportunity to outline some of the key changes that the select committee recommended. Submitters were concerned that lifting just two of the contribution criteria out of the Gazette notice into the Act would result in loss of clarity as to how the criteria interrelate and exactly which criteria a claimant would need to satisfy. The committee therefore recommended a stand-alone provision that groups all the related matters to do with being a qualifying claimant into one subpart. It also recommended inserting a new provision making it clear that in order to receive a contribution from a participating territorial authority a claimant must first have qualified for a Crown contribution.

Submitters also raised concerns that homeowners whose claims had been ruled ineligible because of the interpretation of “built” applied by courts and tribunals before the Osborne v Auckland Council decision, and who had repaired their homes subsequently, would not be able to access the Financial Assistance Package even though they would have been able to meet the contribution criteria at the time their claim was held to be ineligible. It was not the intention that those people should be excluded, so the bill has been amended to allow for this.

Other key recommendations of the committee were around the issues raised around the timing of the issuing of code compliance certificates. Historically, there has been considerable variability around when a territorial authority issues code compliance certificates. To make sure that the bill applies only to those in similar situations to the homeowners in the Osborne case, the committee recommended amendments to make it clear that a code compliance certificate must have been issued by the date of eligibility decision and, in any event, before 1 January 2012, which is in line with the rest of the Act.

I support all of the recommendations of the select committee, and I have no doubt that the bill has been enhanced through this very important process. I commend this bill to the House.

Debate interrupted.