Civil Defence Emergency Management Amendment Act 2016 Amendment Bill

I move, That the Civil Defence Emergency Management Amendment Act 2016 Amendment Bill be now read a third time. There has been a lot of commentary made in the House over the last few hours as we have passed this bill to this point. I just want to take this time to acknowledge the officials who have worked very hard on this, but also to acknowledge the civil defence officials and groups throughout the northern part of the South Island and here in Wellington who have worked so well over the last couple of weeks to try to make things a little easier for those who are most affected.

I also want to acknowledge the many contractors, the many engineers, and the many other people involved in assessment and doing things for the work that they have done, and alongside them, of course, the New Zealand Defence Force and some of our friends from visiting navies throughout the world who also helped at this difficult time for the people of Kaikōura, Hurunui, and Wellington districts, as well as some parts of Marlborough.

This bill passing tonight—as I am sure it will—will enable Parliament to respond to the needs of communities up and down that part of the country who are most in need. I want to thank the House for allowing this urgency motion today. It is not something that the House does lightly. Periodically, the Government will determine that, in our opinion, something needs to go through more quickly than usual. It is seldom that you get the whole House agreeing like that, and I think that indicates the goodwill that has been demonstrated here.

This is a bill that enables us to now move into transition from the state of emergency. It will allow greater focus on recovery, and it will ensure that, particularly here in Wellington, where there are concerns about buildings, those concerns can be known and actions taken to ensure that people who use those buildings are in as safe a situation as possible. I commend the bill to the House.

I want to add Labour’s endorsement to this piece of legislation. I thank the Minister who has just resumed his seat—the Acting Minister of Civil Defence, Gerry Brownlee—for his work in bringing forward the legislation to the House and for being accommodating with changes that have been sought from around the House throughout the process, both in the days before we came here today and, indeed, on the floor of the House today. I also want to take this opportunity to thank the officials who worked very hard to put this piece of legislation together and, indeed, the other post-earthquake legislation that will come before the House. Those officials, looking at their faces yesterday, many of them are very senior officials who have clearly been putting in a lot of time over the last few days to make sure that we get this legislation right. It is not easy to do that work quickly.

Just as a small and not at all meant to be negative aside, I do enjoy it when there is a spelling mistake that can be found, and I know my colleague Peeni Henare is a great fan of these, particularly in Te Reo Māori versions of bills. In fact, you might like this for another reason, because the word “for” has become “fro”, and who does not like a good fro on a good day? But I do, in all seriousness, want to say to the officials that they have done a magnificent job in putting this together.

I also want to continue to emphasise the fact that what we are doing in this House is trying to pass the legislation that will help communities transition from their initial response to the recovery phase. On paper that can look like an exercise that is relatively simple. In reality, for the communities that have been affected by this quake, that is far from simple, and in Kaikōura, in Hurunui, and even here in Wellington, we have people who are going to take some significant time to rebuild their lives. I do not think there is any doubt at all that in Kaikōura there are darker days ahead in terms of the economy, in terms of the way that people feel, because we are not going to see the summer season of tourism that we were. Hopefully, we will be able to make something work for the people of Kaikōura, but as a country we need to gather together to support those communities in this recovery phase. This is the limited thing that as parliamentarians we can do: bring forward the Civil Defence Emergency Management Amendment Act and have that come into force for those communities, and for the processes under that to be advanced.

Most of the discussion around the bill has focused on the new provisions around the requirement or the ability for a direction to be made to owners of structures or types of structures to obtain an assessment on the effect of an emergency and any related subsequent events on those structures. This does represent, I believe, the beginning of some changes that will need to take place around these assessments. I think this is a particularly useful development for the small number of building owners who are not prepared to go as far as they should in assessing the safety of their buildings.

We have had the talk about the various Acts that exist—the Health and Safety at Work Act and the Residential Tenancies Act—and they provide some assurance for people, but this clause will mean a much greater degree of assurance. I hope the officials, in the next phase of their work in this, will look to make sure that this is absolutely clear—not only that assessments must be done when there is a risk to public safety but that the information from those assessments is made available. To pick up my colleague Jan Logie’s reference before, also bear in mind that I suspect these assessments will be available through the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act. So I actually think there would be a way of requesting the assessments if it were to come to that.

But I want to highlight the case of a person in my electorate who, when told by the owner of their building that their building was safe, then asked to see the assessment and was told they could not see it. That person made a very good point to me that, as an individual tenant, they had no ability to pay for an engineer to come in. They barely had the ability, perhaps, to even get the engineer in, in terms of being allowed to bring them into the building. If we look down the road here at the Asteron building, that building was seen, the owner brought an engineer in, and the engineer cleared the building. The Inland Revenue Department, as a tenant, was able to afford to bring in its own engineer, who then came up with a different conclusion—that the building or the stairwell was not safe. So because the Inland Revenue Department could afford to do that, and, being a good employer, did it, a different outcome occurred. There is no one working in that building today, and remediation has been required. That could easily have happened in that residential apartment that I just talked about. Had the tenant been able to afford to bring an engineer in, the engineer may well have come to a different conclusion.

So this piece of legislation is important. It is urgent. The use of urgency is something that we need to be very careful about in this House, but on this occasion I believe that this bill is exactly the kind of thing we do need to use urgency for: to give assurance to those communities who have been affected by these earthquakes that we care, that we understand the things that need to be done quickly, and that we are prepared to take action on that. I want to reiterate what I said in my first-reading speech, which is that I have read the press release today from the Mayor of Wellington, Justin Lester, who has said he will use this legislation as soon as it is passed. That is the importance of passing it, so that we can, in the small number of cases where there have not been appropriate building checks done, ensure that those assessments are done.

I want to acknowledge, as the Minister did, David Parker for his amendments that we have just passed in the Committee stage. These are to make clear that in a situation where someone believes that the requirement to undertake an assessment is not reasonable—and it does have to be reasonable; if they believe it is not reasonable—they have the ability to go to the District Court to challenge that, but that assessment still needs to happen. If it is found in the District Court that it was unreasonable, they will get the costs for that paid back. That is an important clarification and one that I think gives the whole House a lot more certainty and security that the assessments that need to be done will be done, but if authorities have overstepped the mark in doing so, then they will be held to account for that.

The final point I want to make on this matter is to just be absolutely clear that there are rules around requesting these assessments. The purpose of the assessment has to be specified, the time frame within which it has to happen has to be specified, and the requirement for the owner to give a copy of the assessment to the council is also there—and that, in deciding to undertake an assessment, the council must look at the structure of the building, the type of structure, its circumstances, the risk of injury, the risk to life, or the safety of other property. Those are important caveats that make me absolutely confident that we are doing the right thing here tonight—that there are enough checks and balances that councils will not go over the top with the use of these provisions, and that we will actually get a better and a safer assessment and provide a bit more security and certainty to those people who feel, in a situation like this, that they have not had a proper assessment done on their building.

I want to again thank the Minister and all parties in the House for their cooperation on this bill, and to reiterate that, from Labour’s point of view, we remain committed to cooperating with the Government on the next phase of changes to make sure that we have a proper national-level disaster management system, that we have a proper warning system, that we work out exactly what is best in terms of tsunami warnings, and that we do not wait any longer. The Government cannot leave that work on the back-burner. It has spent half a million dollars on the possibility of a national disaster warning system. Let us make the best use of that work. Let us see the next phase of changes brought in as soon as possible, so that we can hold our heads high and say to New Zealanders that we have done everything we can to ensure that they are not only safe in an emergency but supported in the recovery from it.

One thing about civil defence emergencies that we can all be sure of is that we have a plan, an emergency comes along, and then we find a lot of shortcomings, so that we have to then virtually tear up the plan and start again. That is what we are doing here with this legislation. No doubt when another emergency comes along, we will find shortcomings in the legislation again, and we will have to go through the whole process again.

We should not be apologising for that—that is good process and it is something that we have to do. Every emergency is different, and we need to react to them all slightly differently. What we really need from our legislation is enough flexibility for the officials and civil defence to act appropriately at the time and get through that emergency, and we then tidy up the legislation for the next one.

I would like to acknowledge, as others speakers have, the Hon David Parker’s contribution with his amendment. It is quite right to iron out all those crinkles if we can, and it is good due process. I will not take any more of the House’s time. I commend this very fine bill to the House. Thank you.

I am pleased to add my support at the third reading of this bill. It has been put through under urgency, but, as we know, the subject matter is very important and requires us to pass the legislation as quickly as we can. I am pleased to hear that the Mayor of Wellington, Justin Lester, is at the ready, and ready to swing into action directing some building owners to do some proper assessments and to give effect to the provisions of this legislation forthwith.

I will not take too much time, but I do want to add my acknowledgments, as well, to all who have participated in putting together this legislation, at a considerable pace. In particular, I acknowledge the officials and the cross-party approach that has been adopted throughout; I do support that. I do support the amendment that Mr Parker sponsored. It is great that we were able to get a handwritten amendment in place to correct what was one of those little things that an experienced legal practitioner could pick up. That is a good example of this House working cooperatively in an effort to pass this legislation.

When I think of the Civil Defence, a particular gentleman comes to mind, and that is Murray Sinclair. He is the local controller in Kaikōura, with his team that works under him. He is doing an amazing job on the ground there, under very trying circumstances—and, yes, he has been burning the midnight oil for quite a few days now. I just really stood there in awe when I had the privilege of seeing the work that he was doing and that was, particularly, paying close attention to the individual needs and concerns of the residents of Kaikōura. Obviously, he is under a lot of pressure and inundated with a lot of demands and requests from various quarters, but he was very professional in the way he approached all of his work, and especially in the way that he dealt with people—and, indeed, in the way that he gave a briefing to me and other colleagues as we travelled through Kaikōura. He is doing an outstanding job and he is a credit to his organisation.

I do not want to prolong this any further, but I do support this legislation. We are bringing forward these provisions to ensure that there is a seamless transition from this emergency through to the recovery phase, and that they align the legislation with the reality of what is happening on the ground in the Hurunui and the Kaikōura region, and so I commend that.

I also commend the amendments in relation to the requirement to direct building owners to do building assessments. I do not want to tarnish all building owners with the same brush. Actually, I believe that most building owners value the investment they have in their buildings and want to ensure that they are structurally sound, fit for purpose, doing the job properly, and generating a return for the owner. In some instances, unfortunately, there are may be some owners who are derelict in their duties or who perhaps think that it is not necessary to go that extra mile, in their minds, to provide this information.

I believe we have struck the right balance in the drafting of this legislation to compel the owners to provide the proper information, and to give assurances to the controllers, to the tenants, and to the public at large. I am certainly sure that we will be seeing, over the next few days, public notices, as are a requirement under this bill. Public notices will be issued advising the public at large that these directions have been made on building owners. Therefore, the public will know that—at least in relation to those buildings concerned—there is a requirement on the owner to actually come up with the required information to ensure that the building is structurally sound and to give the assurance to the powers who are overseeing the safety issues.

Ultimately, this is what this legislation is about. It is about ensuring safety—we do not want to see the tragedies like that which occurred in Canterbury with the CTV building. As we know—that tragic event—three-quarters of the fatalities in that earthquake occurred in the CTV building. Now, I am not saying that if this legislation was enacted that could have been prevented. Maybe it could have been; maybe it could not. It is not for me to judge, but certainly the fact that we have closed this loophole, fixed this gap, made this requirement—a very sensible requirement; it is not too onerous—does the job in ensuring that building owners do meet their obligations. With that, I would like to commend this bill to the House. Kia ora.

E Te Māngai o Te Whare, pō mārie. In speaking in this third reading debate on the Civil Defence Emergency Management Amendment Act 2016 Amendment Bill I want to join with other members from across the House in congratulating, in particular, the Acting Minister of Civil Defence, Gerry Brownlee, whose indefatigable efforts have steered us through the very worst and most dangerous aspects of this disaster situation. I do also want to pay tribute to my friend and colleague Stuart Smith, the local member for Kaikōura, whose tireless and monumental hard work up and down that electorate I think has been acknowledged widely by members of the public.

In referring to the provisions of the bill in front of us, I think it is a tribute to the Minister who drafted the initial legislation, the Hon Nikki Kaye, that so little in the way of change is required to cope with this situation. We are bringing forward the commencement date, and there is that change that members have extensively canvassed that gives the power for regional controllers and constables to require landlords and building owners—the vast majority of whom are very responsible, but for those tiny minority who are irresponsible—to undertake those engineering assessments to make sure that our apartment dwellers and the businesses that are in those buildings are safe, as every Kiwi has the right to be. It is a very good bill. It is very timely. I will not take up any more time. I commend it.

I am pleased to speak on the Civil Defence Emergency Management Amendment Act 2016 Amendment Bill at this, the third reading. Firstly, in this final contribution, I want to offer my acknowledgment and thanks to the many public servants who have been providing really valuable advice through this process, and who have enabled us to get the bill to this stage today. I think, sometimes, many people in New Zealand think of public servants as these faceless people who are a drain on our system, who all live in Wellington, and who do not understand what real life is like. Well, I think the advice that we have had and this bill are an indication of the massive value that they offer to all of us, and when Governments listen to the people and respond—and public servants provide the support beside that—then, actually, this is what collaboration looks like.

It is—I do need to say again—unusual for the Greens to be supporting legislation through under urgency. We are comfortable doing it in this situation for two main reasons: one, the largest part of this bill is bringing forward legislation that has already been passed very recently and that went through a full select committee process. The second reason is around ensuring councils or recovery managers and controllers have the ability to require building assessments to be done within a specific time frame and the results given back to those controllers. There is a need for that right now in Wellington. We understand that, and we think this is appropriate to be done under urgency.

I would, on that note, refer back to the story that was in the paper just a few days ago of the New Zealand Public Service Association raising the alarm on behalf of staff of the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) who had concerns about the safety of their building. It turned out that a manager at NIWA had signed off the building as safe without it having had an engineer’s assessment. So the union had to come behind those staff to be able to protect them from being in a building that they were unconfident was safe. So we do know that there could be a problem, and so it is appropriate to provide Wellingtonians with that security. I am pleased to hear that the mayor himself was saying that he will be using this provision. That is about being able to be confident about the safety of those buildings across Wellington and in other areas, now.

It is also about knowing that there is going to be a series of aftershocks, and we do not know how significant they are going to be. If we can get those assessments done now across the region, then we have got that information on record at council. So if there are further significant shocks, then we have that record of what state the buildings are in. Even if they are safe for people but there is damage, we have that as our base, which the council and the recovery team can use to be able to assess whether there needs to be another assessment done. That just helps with the recovery process and makes sure that things are streamlined, which is part of the intent of the Civil Defence Emergency Management Amendment Act 2016, which we are bringing the implementation of forward.

I will just reference a couple of points that came up through the select committee process of that original amendment bill, which was the acknowledgement that it is important that local communities and councils are engaged in that recovery process and that the civil defence emergency management framework recognises that principle of acting locally, coordinating regionally, and supporting nationally. That is what this legislation, at heart, is about: us in this Parliament providing the support for that local action, and it being collaborative and supporting agencies working together is a theme of the civil defence emergency management plan. It has been really pleasing to see that in practice through the process of leading us to this legislation today.

When we heard submissions from Christchurch people on that bill, they were telling us that the key lesson from the Canterbury earthquakes and the effect on Christchurch was the value of the collaborative approach. This legislation is an example of that collaboration, in fact, and will enable better planning and coordination for smoother collaboration at a local level as it implemented.

There have been quite a few acknowledgments this evening of the National Government member Stuart Smith and Labour Party member Rino Tirikatene. And I do want to just acknowledge my Green Party colleague Steffan Browning who is also from the area and has been all over the area and went into Clarence at the time when the dam was building. He was checking on people and making sure that they had what they needed, and he has been providing us with feedback from people in the local communities to make sure that our understanding of what is happening is grounded in those local experiences as well. That is so crucial—that this concept of collaboration does not apply just to Government. It is for all of us in this process of understanding to be grounding our understanding in the experiences of those most affected.

What also has been raised is the issue about us needing to be able to address some of those wider issues at a later date in terms of the warning system. That is something that we also support in the Greens and it was mentioned how that applies in Porirua. I also would like to make particular mention that I lived in Japan at one stage in my life and there was an earthquake over there at the time. There was a tsunami warning alert that came out and I did not speak Japanese at that stage, so the only word I could understand over the loud hailer was “tsunami, tsunami”. It was absolutely terrifying.

There is an understanding that the Deaf community is wanting a response to civil defence emergencies that will alert them—one that is not siren based, because that relies on hearing. We need to ensure that people who do not have English are also alerted to be able to understand these warnings. That is also a lesson that we need to apply when we are talking about preparedness, as we have in the House this evening, which is something that needs to be happening across the country, but particularly across the areas that have already been affected and are shifting into recovery.

We do know that there are risks of significant aftershocks ahead of us, and we do not know what scale they will be on. For all of us to be able to have a degree of comfort, the comfort can come with preparedness, and that is about getting your plan ready, about getting your kit ready, and about knowing where you are going and how to get to the people you want to be with. That has been pleasing to hear in the debate this evening—the common understanding around that and the support for people to be able to move forward into the future. Thank you.

To members of the House here tonight and to ladies and gentlemen back home watching exciting, entertaining late-night TV, it is not a matter of “if” we have another earthquake; it is a matter of “when” we are going to have another earthquake, or a sizable civil defence emergency, in this country. We do not know how big it is going to be, but it is inevitable. We are going to have some more of what we have had, and potentially larger than what we have got.

This bill is about readiness and recovery, but it is more about the recovery side. It is not really about readiness because I do not think this bill covers off the large extent of the earthquake or civil defence matters that we are talking about here, whether they be tsunamis or landslides or, dare I say it, seismic shifts that are going to bring buildings down. This bill here as it stands in the House is just a quick fix. It is a band-aid. There is a template here that we need to grow on, and New Zealand First certainly would endorse a speedy bill being brought to this House that looks after the “part 2” of the Kaikōura earthquake. As we sit here now today, we are only patching up a few areas that we have seen we have got some flaws in. The bigger picture is actually to be really in a state of readiness, so that we can quickly recover and get our communities and our lives back intact and back on track once we have an event such as we have just witnessed down in Kaikōura.

Dare I say it—it is a bit clichéd, I know—there is a certain steady resolve of the people down in Kaikōura. Somebody made a comment about something that I had posted on social media, saying: “That’s just a cliché. Nobody’s ever ready for that.” But going down there and actually speaking to the people of Kaikōura—and I would have loved to have spent more time going into more remote areas—there is a bit of a “Keep calm and carry on” feel down there. Panicking or getting themselves into a state of flux is not going to help. They know that they have got a job to get on with, and they expect us to be here as Government officials to ensure that we can actually help them with that recovery state, which, again, this bill helps to do. It does deal with recovery; it does not prepare us for the readiness that we are talking about for those large events.

Going down to Kaikōura and speaking to police and spending some time down there with some of the issues that they have had—with visitors and moving those groups of people out of the area, and with the huge amounts of food and water and fuel that were required to keep that community operating—the goodwill of the people, particularly at the marae, where they were housing and feeding up to a thousand people a day and were just so happy to do so, was great to see. There is a resolve, a “Keep calm and carry on” attitude of Kiwis, that I love to see. I certainly do applaud the manner in which people have conducted themselves, despite the deplorable actions of a very, very small group of people who decided to take the opportunity to do some looting in the area—something that is frowned upon by all corners of our communities and something that we hope to see stamped down on with very strong, severe punishment, and with the legislation to do so.

We certainly will be continuing our support to get this bill through the House as we go through the night so that it can actually be implemented tomorrow. We have heard the mayor here in Wellington himself, Justin Lester, say that he will be implementing aspects of this new legislation for Wellington. If you look at the trajectory from 2011, when the earthquake was in Christchurch, to Kaikōura—if you are plotting a graph, you can see that there is almost an “inevilability”—that is not a word; I made that up, but it sounded sort of right, did it not? There is an inevitability that there is going to end up being an earthquake here. It is something that has been predicted for a very long time.

Making sure that the large buildings and structures in this city are ready and actually fit for purpose is hugely important as we move forward. It is about making sure that people have the resolve—“peace of mind” is the phrase I am thinking of. Public safety is one concern, but peace of mind—although the bill does not directly specify that the seismic reports on these buildings are given directly to the tenants themselves, they certainly will be accessible, because, of course, through territorial authorities and councils you can access that sort of information on building plans, etc. But it certainly would be nice. I am sure that in many cases—in most cases, even—you will have landlords acting responsibly, making sure that that information is available for their tenants. It is, of course, in their best interests that they have got tenants who feel comfortable working in that environment and that building—and living and sleeping while being in that environment, also. We hope to see the good nature of that.

That does bring me to a conclusion. In so far as we have had 11 Government buildings be all but condemned after this recent magnitude 7.5 shake, I have to say that, of the number of earthquakes that I have been in, this was probably one of the most gentle. I felt it in Tauranga at 6 minutes past midnight, but it was quite gentle, and I understand from people who were here in Wellington that it was not the sort of violent shake that Christchurch felt. If it had been a different shake, we might have had a different result. I cannot believe that out of the number of properties that have been red-stickered in Wellington, 11 of them—the vast majority of them—are Government businesses. I just think that a lot of the work has not been done yet. Are we adequately resourced with those building inspectors to ensure that? Are they resourced with the right numbers of staff to get around to make sure that that work happens? I certainly hope that councils and this Government ensure that that can be done swiftly, effectively, and efficiently, so that those people can feel safe and be safe in our streets.

We will be continuing our support for this legislation. We would like to see it brought to fruition tomorrow. We would certainly, again, ask urgency of this Government to bring part 2 of this legislation, which encompasses recovery and readiness for large-scale events. This is just a band-aid fixing that up, but we need to think of the bigger picture as we move forward. Thank you.

It is a pleasure to rise in what appears to be a speedy and successful conclusion of this very important bill. I would like to acknowledge Minister Brownlee and the other members across the House, including Mr Parker, who have worked together very constructively to bring us to where we are. In fact, Mr Parker’s position helped to make a good bill that much better. I would also like to acknowledge the efforts of my colleague Stuart Smith, who has responded extremely well for his local communities. He has been there to support them, to listen to them, and to give them a very, very strong voice back into Government.

I could take an opportunity to rehash the provisions of the bill, but I think at this stage, actually, what is best is that we conclude this business so that our authorities can get on with helping people to recover from the earthquakes. I commend this bill to the House.

The next call is a split call. Eugenie Sage—5 minutes.

Tēnā koe, Mr Assistant Speaker. Thank you. Like the previous speaker, I am not going to rehash provisions of the bill in this third reading, but I would like to place on record our thanks to all of the professionals in Kaikōura, North Canterbury, and Marlborough, who are working so hard to deal with the aftermath of the earthquakes. People like the scientist Dr Kelvin Berryman, who has been on video just explaining the whole process of the uplift on the coast—helping us to understand the energy that the quakes released, the damage that that has done, and assisting people working to reopen the road. People like all of the professionals from the Canterbury District Health Board, who are there, having experienced the Canterbury earthquakes, knowing how to respond, and working alongside people in Kaikōura.

Going down to the new council building about 10 days ago—and that is now the hub of the civil defence activity—an enormous number of people there are putting in very long hours to provide that practical support to the community, working alongside a lot of volunteers in the Fire Service and elsewhere. There are all of the folk on the marae who provided such enormous hospitality and support for a lot of tourists and others, and the large number of public servants here in Wellington who put in a lot of time developing and drafting this legislation. I would also like, again, to acknowledge the Minister and his consultation, and councils such as Waimakariri, which have provided staff to work alongside the very small Kaikōura District Council, to share their experience of responding, and the best ways of the community and the council working to pick up the pieces after the quake.

Given the collaborative nature in which this bill has developed, I would encourage the Government with the national emergency response—the bill that is going to come into the House later—to produce an exposure draft. That is because where there is an opportunity for all parties and stakeholders to comment on that before it goes formally into the House it develops better law, we have a better and more constructive debate around the provisions, and it is just generally better informed. So this process with this small but important bill has been a good one, and, I think with that, thank you.

E Te Māngai o Te Whare, tēnā koe. E ngā mema o Te Whare nei, tēnā tātou katoa. I am happy to join in the chorus of support in the third reading of the Civil Defence Emergency Management Amendment Act 2016 Amendment Bill. The bill brings forward by 6 months the commencement of the Civil Defence Emergency Management Amendment Act 2016, I heard the Minister say it is to 28 November, when this bill received its Royal assent. What the second part the bill attempts is to add a new power to the Act so that during states of emergency or transition periods building owners can be required to carry out assessments of structures to determine whether they are sound and to provide a copy of these. This can also apply to situations like a flood as well as an earthquake.

On 14 November I was not in Wellington, but I did feel the earthquake in Hawke’s Bay. But like many members in this House, I have an apartment here in Wellington and it received quite a bit of damage. My university-age son was in the apartment at the time. I took a call just after midnight. This son of mine is no daisy; he is about 6 feet 2 inches tall and weighs about 100 kilograms. The fear in his voice—he is probably going to get me if he hears me talking about him, but, seriously, he was very, very frightened. He had never been in an earthquake. All I remember saying to him was to get out of the apartment—get out of the apartment.

So that was Monday the 14th. On Tuesday, 15 November, as we all do, we returned to Wellington, and, of course, my son completely said “I am out of here, Mum. I am not coming back to your apartment.”, and I do not think he has returned since. Having said that, the issue around making sure that I was going back to a safe apartment was critical in my mind. I want to share with the House that I instigated calling the property manager, from whom I had rented the place, notwithstanding that it was only a 3-year-old apartment building.

So I started the process of ensuring that it was safe before I went in. I can tell you that on Monday I could not get hold of anybody from this particular property management company, and I finally got hold of them on Tuesday. We were here in Parliament, obviously, right until 10 p.m., so I did not get back to the apartment until 10.30 p.m., and, as I expected, literally every piece of glass and cutlery in my kitchen was on the ground. I guess I was more devastated by the fact that there was a bottle of red on the floor. Of course, we all—

💬 Hon Member: Hawke’s Bay—Hawke’s Bay.

It was a very good Hawke’s Bay merlot, I must say, but I think I was more devastated by that than anything else. The point I am making is that this bill has been born out of disaster, and we have all acknowledged that in terms of this earthquake. Many tenants and building operators are looking for something that gives some surety that buildings are safe post-earthquake. So I do want to commend the Minister for bringing this bill to the House and adding that particular assurance to many tenants around Wellington in particular.

Of course, we acknowledge the people of Kaikōura. We have acknowledged everybody involved in bringing this bill here, and can I say that we acknowledge all the people in Kaikōura and all the people helping that community and the Wellington community to get back on their feet.

Can I say that in disasters come good things. One of the good things I believe this bill brings is an opportunity for members of this House in terms of their pronunciation of Kaikōura. Tonight I have listened to very varied versions of Kaikōura—“Kaikōura” not “Kaikura”, and doing a bit more when it comes to pronouncing our Māori language is probably something all of us in the House can reflect on. I just want to leave that as a gesture of goodwill to members—we should work a bit harder, because people do look to this House when it comes to our languages in this country, and we have more than one. Like all members in this House, I commend this bill to the House.

It is a pleasure to rise in support of the third reading of the Civil Defence Emergency Management Amendment Act 2016 Amendment Bill. From a proud born and bred Cantabrian, who for many years pronounced it as “Kaikora”, it was always a great trip up to Kaikōura; but, alas, we learn over time, and I am happy to now attempt to pronounce it “Kaikōura”.

💬 Hon Member: Come on.

I am getting there. [Interruption] We Cantabrians learn slowly, but we do get there. Could I just acknowledge the MP for Kaikōura, Stuart Smith, for the fantastic work he is doing on the ground.

As a North Canterbury resident, it was quite a shake in the early hours of that Monday morning. Your initial fears are for your family and then you start thinking about your local towns that you live in, in my electorate, Kaiapoi, Rangiora, Pegasus, Waikuku, Woodend. There were many fears based on the previous experience we have had—the earthquakes in 2010 and in 2011. Of course, we lost a lot of housing in the first earthquakes in 2010 in Kaiapoi. But I must say thanks to building owners and the Waimakariri District Council where there are a lot of investments into upgrades, and it has increased our capacity to cope.

This bill is based on building assessments. In the first earthquakes, Rangiora was still having problems with buildings that were open a year after the earthquakes, so it is right that we are focusing on building assessments. It is a great bill. I commend it to the House.

Not much remains to be said in this debate, so I will keep my contribution short. This bill, I think, has attracted a lot of agreement and support from around the House—both process and content. It is a small part of the much bigger, broader response to the quake recovery and transition stage, but it will allow councils in areas that have buildings that are affected by earthquakes and other disasters to require assessments of those buildings.

We support this bill. There is much more beyond the scope of this bill that needs to be done in terms of determining the lessons that can be learnt about why, for example, in Wellington so many relatively modern buildings sustained such serious damage; real questions about the standard and the quality of compliance with the building code, and the standards within the code; and, interestingly, in Wellington, I think why such a high proportion of the affected buildings are government buildings—publicly owned or publicly tenanted buildings. That is an interesting question that I hope Dr Nick Smith’s inquiry will shed some light on.

Really, I think it is the Wellington experience that has prompted the need for this bill: where you have got a CBD that was still working soon after the quakes, but the map is peppered with buildings that were affected, with serious damage, emptied of tenants, and cordoned off. It is vitally important that the public can have confidence that the authorities are on top of the situation and can very quickly determine whether or not buildings are safe for the people in and around them. I give credit to the Acting Minister of Civil Defence and all the parties, I think, for working on this bill, getting it together, making the necessary improvements, and taking it through the House.

Bill read a third time.