Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Leader of the House) on behalf of the Minister for Building and Construction: I move, That the Building Amendment Bill be now read a third time. This bill will improve the clarity and effectiveness of the regulatory reforms set up under the Building Act 2004. The Building Act was introduced in response to the systemic issues that led to major building failures in the 1990s, and, in a wider sense, to an expectation of re-establishing our world-class reputation for quality-built buildings. The regulatory costs around the new schemes in the Act reflect the necessary rebalancing of a building control system that had fewer upfront costs and controls, but will potentially cost $1 billion to $2.2 billion for the downstream costs of repairing thousands of leaky homes. By introducing more robustness and accountability into the process at the front end, we are ensuring that buildings will be built right the first time, and that costs will be lower over the lifetime of a building. This Government will continue to work on refining this risk-cost balance with the sector.

In response to claims that the Building Act creates unnecessary bureaucracy and costs, I note that the World Bank’s Doing Business in 2008 report includes a section that compares the regulatory requirements and costs to businesses of building a warehouse. On this measure we are ranked in second place, while Australia is ranked 52nd out of 178 countries.

I thank the Social Services Committee, which is chaired by Russell Fairbrother, for its excellent work. There have been a number of minor amendments, and these should help in producing a workable piece of legislation. I thank the Minister for Building and Construction’s predecessor, the Hon Clayton Cosgrove, for introducing the bill, and I thank the interest groups and those who made submissions on the bill. I am pleased to commend the Building Amendment Bill to the House.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson) : This morning’s Dominion Post contains this headline: “Building costs putting homes ‘beyond reach’ ”, and the article states: “The cost of building an average-size house has sky-rocketed in the past seven years—from $232,000 to $422,000.” That is an increase in the cost of building an average house of $190,000, and the question that National members ask about the Building Amendment Bill is whether it will address the housing affordability crisis. The answer is that it will not. The answer is that it will make the problem worse.

There are two major changes in this bill. The first of those is around the very complex system that the Government has imposed on councils in respect of their being accredited as building consent authorities. We have a bloated Government bureaucracy called the Department of Building and Housing. It has gone from having 30 staff to having nearly 500 staff, and it is now trying to impose the same sort of bureaucracy on councils.

I was interested to note that the Government has just congratulated the Rodney District Council on its new building consent process. If anyone wants to build, or even put in a drain, in Rodney there is now a 110-page form to fill out, and this bill reinforces the sort of mad, bureaucratic imposition that this Government has put on the building industry. But it goes further.

This bill seeks to retrospectively dump on councils and homeowners the costs of that accreditation process. That is in complete contradiction to everything that New Zealanders are saying in the area of what this bill attempts to do. We had, only 12 months ago, a rating inquiry into the extra costs that central government was imposing on councils, and that rating inquiry said that the Government needed to stop passing these sorts of laws. They give the capacity for the Department of Building and Housing to dump its bureaucratic costs on to councils, and councils have absolutely no choice but to cough up and pay. National says that that is wrong. National says that this bill is adding to the huge increase in rates that is driving New Zealanders, up and down this country, mad.

There is a second set of changes in this bill that National further objects to. It is just so typical of the red tape and bureaucracy that Labour is imposing on New Zealanders. There was a time when the Labour Party celebrated the heritage of Norm Kirk, who built his own house in Kaiapoi. But what does this bill do? This bill means that young, aspiring New Zealanders will be prohibited by red tape from being able to build their own houses. Again, National says that it was not the do-it-yourself builder who brought about the leaky home crisis; it was dodgy developers, it was poor council process, and it was the issues around untreated timber and building products. It was not the do-it-yourself builders. Norm Kirk would be rolling in his grave to know that the Labour Party is today reinforcing legislation that will say to New Zealanders that they cannot build their own houses. Well, I say to New Zealanders that National is on the way back, and we will restore the rights of New Zealanders to build their own homes.

I will now go to the report that has been produced by the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, dated March 2008 and released yesterday. This report says that building costs are skyrocketing, and that homes are now further away from being affordable for families than at any time in our history. The report notes that there has been the biggest fall in homeownership rates since census data began in 1892, and this Government has the worst record of any Government in the 116 years since, in respect of home affordability. The report further notes that the biggest fall in home affordability is in relation to those aged between 25 and 35. Those are the young aspiring New Zealanders, and it is little wonder that 70,000 of them are abandoning this country and building their futures in other parts of the world when there is this sort of escalation in housing costs.

What is even more important is what this report says about what needs to be done to improve housing affordability. It says that lower costs of sections and construction are the most likely way of Government policy achieving a long-term reduction in housing costs, and that reforms need to be made in the streamlining of the regulatory systems, especially around the Resource Management Act and the building consent process. National members say: “Hear, hear! That is what we have been arguing about with the Resource Management Act and the Building Act, until we have almost lost our voices, for 8 or 9 years.” What, then, has the Government done after reading that official Government report? It has moved the third reading of the Building Amendment Bill, which adds even further to those very building costs that are causing the crisis.

Let me outline for the House the sorts of things that this bill means for communities around New Zealand. The building consent fees in Nelson City have just been put up by 15 percent. In the Tasman district next door they have been put up by 37 percent. In Dunedin City building consent fees have been put up by 67 percent. In this very city, the Wellington City Council has noted that 4 years ago it used to take three A4 plans and 20 pages of documentation to get a building consent for the average house. The new Act will require 12 A4 plans and 200 pages of documentation to get a building consent for that house. That is outrageous. That is paperwork gone mad, and this bill furthers that problem.

National opposes this bill because it does absolutely nothing to address the housing affordability crisis we have in New Zealand. We have the second worst home affordability in the OECD, and our homeownership rates are plummeting. That great Kiwi value of the average family being able to own their own home has been ruined by this Government and by this sort of legislation. We have a building sector that is in crisis, and we have builders leaving the country because they have had it with this sort of bureaucracy.

This bill should be rejected. We need to go back and amend the Building Act 2004 to bring the red tape and the bureaucracy back under control. We need to drive building quality by putting the commercial tension on the building industry to make sure that it is financially responsible for its building products and for the design, inspection, and construction of homes in New Zealand. This bill does nothing of the sort, and it should be rejected by this House so that we might be able to get some policies that actually improve home affordability in New Zealand.

LYNNE PILLAY (Labour—Waitakere) : Once again we have heard the member who spoke previously, Dr Nick Smith, criticising and being incredibly critical, and using the old National mantra about there being increased bureaucracy in councils. We heard all about that last night. We heard the myths and legends that that party created around the Waitakere Ranges Heritage Area Bill, and we hear them now in this case, when we are looking at the Building Amendment Bill. We are actually looking at ensuring that there is more accountability, more safety, and—

Hon Dr Nick Smith: More costs.

LYNNE PILLAY: —more investment, actually, in the industry.

Let us look at the real story and facts around homeownership. Has there been a reduction in homeownership rates? Yes, there has. That is happening in every developed country, and this Labour-led Government is now finding ways to address that. How are we doing that? We have introduced the Welcome Home Loan scheme, which has helped well over 3,000 Kiwis get into their first home. The National Party, of course, did not vote for that legislation; it voted against it.

In terms of our KiwiSaver scheme, which is something that we will see the benefits of in years to come, the good thing is that not only is it a wonderful scheme for getting people involved in saving for their superannuation but also it is of really tangible assistance to first-home buyers. How does it work? I can see John Carter looking puzzled. John Carter’s mum would be very interested in this. His party did not support KiwiSaver, and why not? I find that really tragic. It offends me to the hilt.

But what is so great about the KiwiSaver scheme is that once people have saved for 3 years or more to buy their first home, they can take out those savings and use them as a deposit on a house. A tax credit from the Government and the employers’ contribution, which will be starting in April of this year, will also go into the deposit. On top of that, those people will get $1,000 gifted towards that deposit from the Labour-led Government after a maximum of 5 years. So let us look at it. A young couple, or an older couple, who want to buy a house and who are part of KiwiSaver get their savings, the tax credits from the Government, the employer contribution, plus an extra $10,000 to put towards buying that house. That is helping our homeownership rates, and that is what this Government is about.

We are also introducing a shared equity scheme, and that will be rolled out in the very near future. That will assist in the future our families, our people, to own their own home. We are also introducing new legislation that will assist the process—assist the bureaucracy, as the National Opposition would say—and look at the construction of medium-priced homes in communities, so that low to middle income families can afford to buy their own home.

Whilst we are talking about housing, let us look at Hobsonville.

Bob Clarkson: What a disaster.

LYNNE PILLAY: “What a disaster.”, the member says, about a development that will deliver 3,000 houses. Which member had the cheek to stand and oppose that development at public meetings? “I do not want Housing New Zealand Corporation houses. I do not want low to medium density housing on my patch. Oh no, not in Hobsonville!”. Who was that member? It was the very slippery Mr John Key—“Slippery John”. We have not heard from John, and it will be interesting to know whether he will take a call on this today to answer our questions on this. Mr John Key, the leader of the National Party, opposed that development happening in Hobsonville, and he wound up a storm about affordable housing in his own electorate. I say, shame on him.

Whilst we are on the subject, let us talk about why we have problems in the building industry. I heard Nick Smith talk about dodgy developers. Which Government deregulated that industry? Which Government scrapped the Apprenticeship Act? Which Government said: “Hey, we do not really need apprentices. We will not support apprentices any more.”? It was the previous National Government. We had the loss of those skills and tradespeople, so many of whom were in the building industry—we are looking at building, here—and they were just part of a declining mass of workers under the National Government.

I am really proud that this Government has reintroduced apprenticeships. We are now seeing far more young apprentices and older apprentices getting skills and training in those vital areas of construction and manufacturing, and our country is all the richer for it.

The Building Amendment Bill is about ensuring that quality homes and buildings meet New Zealanders’ needs, and it re-establishes our reputation for world-class quality construction. The Building Act was significant legislation in 2004, and it was expected at the time that it would need updating to maximise its effectiveness. With more robustness and accountability into the process, at the top end, where it matters, we will ensure that our buildings are built correctly the first time, that costs will be lower over the lifetime of the building, and that the stress and anxiety homeowners experience will simply not be there, or certainly will not be as much of a stress and a challenge as it has been in the past. We will continue to work on refining the risks and the cost balance when we are building, and within the building sector.

I am really proud to commend this bill to the House. I know that it does go a long way towards what we want to see. I know that it gives more certainty to those people who are building their first home, or building a home per se. It also gives certainty to those people who are buying a home that they know they are getting a quality product, that the work has been done, and, as Nick Smith would say, that the bureaucracy has been carried out. They will have more certainty that they have a more professional product, and they will not face the stress and anxiety they faced under the policies that that National Party over there introduced when it was in Government. I commend this bill to the House.

BOB CLARKSON (National—Tauranga) : I would love to spend an hour talking about Hobsonville, but I had better keep off that as I would rather talk about the bill. One has to earn about $120,000 a year to be able to afford a house in Hobsonville. It is a disaster waiting to happen.

I am happy to talk about this amendment bill. In private enterprise the secret of success is to find the problem before we fix the problem. The Minister for Building and Construction is following on from eight former Ministers in not finding the problem. This Minister still wants to licence tradesmen carpenters. The problem was caused mainly by using faulty materials. Would it not be a good idea to fix the problem? Tradesmen carpenters were not the main reason for leaky homes. I say we should fix the problem.

This amendment bill goes nowhere near fixing the problem. We are still building leaky houses. The Minister might not understand when I say that we are still face-fixing cladding on to houses. This allows no air to circulate. Why have we not made cavity walls compulsory, to let some air through and keep them dry? Licensing tradesmen carpenters, as we are doing in this amendment to the Building Act, does nothing to fix leaky homes or stop leaky homes from being built. All this bill does is add a $2,000 licensing fee on to the cost of a house. I do not think that is a very bright idea.

I would like to mention that I am a tradesman in another field. I am proud to be a tradesman, and I do not need to be licensed. I am a tradesman and I have the right to do what my trade says. The previous Minister for Building and Construction, Clayton Cosgrove, and the present Minister, Shane Jones, keep pushing the amendment to license tradesmen.

The Minister should concentrate on fixing the problem—I come back to that all the time. In the building industry we have been using timber treatment methods that are causing serious health problems. People who are working on building sites throughout New Zealand are getting nosebleeds, coughing up blood, and getting serious rashes on their bodies. I would think that the health of a carpenter would be more important than bringing in an amendment to faulty legislation. There have been four goes at this now, and they have all failed.

The Labour Government has known for 18 months about health problems in this industry to do with the treatment of timber, and it has done nothing. Changing Ministers has not helped the problem. Perhaps they do not like talking to each other.

One amendment to the bill talks about supervising restricted building work. A DIY builder will have to have a licensed building practitioner to oversee his or her work. Why would we want a system whereby DIY builders build a house, a building practitioner checks the work, and then an inspector from the council re-inspects the work? This is top heavy in a bureaucratic system.

We just need top-rate inspectors, and houses will be right. What building practitioner will sign off somebody else’s work without charging a high fee or taking out insurance against the risk of doing that job? All these costs will go on to the final cost of a house. My prediction is that with all these amendments and rules, costs will go through the roof. We will not be able to build houses, because of the price. One good thing about that is we will not have any more leaky homes.

DAIL JONES (NZ First) : New Zealand First supports the Building Amendment Bill, which is largely a technical amendment to the Building Act and has special provisions with regard to dams. Various issues about building have been raised during the course of this debate. I just want to make the point that New Zealand First sees the solution to building problems, especially with large building projects, as being similar to that adopted in many other countries, which is to ensure that when any large builder is involved in a large building contract, he or she takes out insurance in order to ensure that if anything goes wrong, the subsequent buyer will be protected. That is New Zealand First’s policy. I hope Mr Clarkson will care to think about that, because obviously there is no one more concerned to make sure that a job is done properly than the insurance company itself. It will make sure that things go through properly, and that we will not have leaky homes and the like.

But, of course, why do we have leaky homes? I was here in the House when the weathertight homes legislation and the Building Bill were introduced. We have leaky homes because of the sloppy practices that developed in the 1990s when the previous National Government, regrettably, decided that everything was free enterprise and the market would prevail. We ended up with cheap materials and, consequently, leaky homes resulted. This bill is an effort to add to the amending legislation that has tried to stop that from happening again in the future—that is what it amounts to.

I am very interested in the matters that have been raised about council costs. I am sure that Mr Clarkson would be the first to agree that sometimes councils take advantage of changes in regulations to rip off the builder, to rip off the homeowner, and to add things to the building consent costs that they then blame on the Government, but that are really a way for councils to put more money in their pocket for things that are not really related to the actual construction of the home itself.

For example, in a case that I was looking at, a young person was told that the council charged a financial contribution to offset the effect of development. Initially, that cost was $5,000 in 2000, but recently it has increased to $30,000. It has nothing to do with the building consent application, nothing to do with the plans and suchlike, but is a total rip-off, in my view, on the part of councils, right around the country, that are blaming the respective Governments of the day. That happens irrespective of whether National, Labour, New Zealand First, or some other party is in Government. Councils do their best to rip off people by saying that the cost is all the Government’s fault, but really it is part of the councils’ ruse to put some money in their pocket, which they then use on various other council projects.

I had an example the other day of someone who was trying to put in a granny flat at a place in Takapuna, and he had to apply to the North Shore City Council. He informed me that before he had even started building and getting his building consents and suchlike under way, the North Shore City Council wanted to charge him $83,000 for a granny flat to be put in a home that used to house five people. The home now has only two people in it and there will be only one more person living there, the granny. But for some reason or other, in order to be able to let granny live there in a granny flat, that person had to put in $83,000 up front before he could even get into the resource consent and building consent processes required for the building work on the house.

The issue of costs lies to a large extent in councils’ policies of creaming off money from people and blaming that on the Government of the day, irrespective of which party might be in Government. That has to be closely considered by all parties when they look at councils’ budgets and when councillors come up for election in the years ahead. I think that part of the problem is that new councillors on councils just follow the advice of the officials, who blind them with science. The councillors go ahead and allow rules to get through, without fully appreciating what is happening, because all those people with high diplomas in planning—bachelors of this and masters of that—confuse and blind many new councillors, and councillors generally, in local authorities.

I was interested in what has been happening in Hobsonville, because I lived in Hobsonville for 18 years and I have worked in the area, one way or another, since 1975. I was very disappointed with the attitude adopted by Mr John Key when he changed his mind on what was to happen in Hobsonville. I will be watching very closely the developments in Hobsonville, because I still think that it is an economic disaster to build 3,000 homes on some of the prime land in Auckland, as is proposed. I think that policy has to be considered closely, and I disagree entirely with John Key’s change of view on the Hobsonville area. As a person who goes by that land regularly and who knows the land extremely well, I will be keeping a close watch on it, as I did before when I was the member of Parliament for the area.

The Housing Corporation used to love to put State houses in the Hobsonville area. I said to the Minister of Housing one day that I was quite happy to have two State houses in my electorate for every one that he had in his. That actually stopped the building of State houses in my electorate. Sometimes one has to put those issues to Ministers of Housing in a cold, blunt way, and that improved the situation in Hobsonville and West Harbour. The reason why we do not have so many State houses in that area today is that I really put my foot down on the matter when I was a member of Parliament between 1975 and 1984.

As far as John Key’s view on Hobsonville is concerned, I see that he is agreeing now to have wide-scale housing, and housing that is possibly not of the highest quality, on the best-quality land in New Zealand. I am also concerned that he may have changed his mind on a commercial airport being built in Whenuapai. I am totally opposed to a commercial airport being built in Whenuapai, and I wonder whether John Key has also had a change of heart on that issue. I would hope that the Whenuapai airport people get in touch with John Key to make sure that has not been another change of mind on his part.

This bill is essentially technical legislation, as I have said. Because it touches on such an important issue, obviously there is a tendency towards a wider-ranging debate than might normally be the case, and I have just taken this opportunity to answer some of the questions that have been raised. New Zealand First supports the bill.

JOHN CARTER (National—Northland) : I firstly say that it just shows how important Government members think this bill is when they have one Minister come and speak on the bill—the Minister of Finance, who actually has no idea about the building industry, at all. He would struggle to build a dunny in a bush, quite honestly. He would not know which end of the nail to put into the wall, yet he spoke on the bill for about 2 minutes. Then we had a Government member, who, I understand, is retiring but does not have a trip yet, and she spoke on the bill. And that seems to be the Government’s contribution in defence of this bill. That just shows how important Government members think it is. It is surprising, is it not, that the Minister in charge of the bill has not yet come down to speak on it? He may well do, and we are looking for that contribution. I will look forward to it but I am disappointed; I would have thought that that Minister would have wanted to lead this debate. So we are looking forward with some pleasure to his contribution.

The second thing I will say is that I listened closely to the contribution made by Dail Jones, and I just want to remind him about the time he was here in the House. I was reflecting on whether he was actually in the House in 1990. I have a funny feeling that he was not.

Dail Jones: No.

JOHN CARTER: He was not. I thought I heard him say that he was in this House—

Dail Jones: 2002.

JOHN CARTER: Oh, it was 2002, of course. Well, the member certainly was in the House at that time. I knew that he had been in the House earlier, but I could not remember just how much earlier. I think it was up until 1984, from memory, and then he came back in 1999.

Dail Jones: 2002.

JOHN CARTER: Oh, in 2002 he came back—right. Then he resurrected himself again, and here he is. But he made the point about the whole issue of responsibility and where it should lie. There is a simple answer, and soon we will make clear what it is.

I will pick up on one point the member made. He talked about the North Shore City Council and about the fact that some unfortunate person had been levied $83,000, I think he said. I cannot speak on the particulars of that case, but it is true that the North Shore City Council was certainly charging way above what it should have been charging. The member may know that that council was taken to court, and there is now case law that stops that sort of activity. Most local authorities have not charged at that level; most local authorities have been responsible. The North Shore City Council was made an example of and has now had to reduce its whole charging regime, and that has set an example for local government across the country. Local government has actually picked it up.

The real problem—and this is the dilemma—is that what is happening, and what will happen even further, is that this bill is loading costs on to councils, it is loading costs on to builders, and it is loading costs on to homeowners. That is where the tragedy is. Even worse is the fact that the bill is not just loading on costs, rules, and regulations but it is not addressing the problem. In fact, this is the fourth time this Government has endeavoured to fix the problem. The tragedy is that the Government has the Department of Building and Housing, which, the last time I looked, employs 385 people, but that number has probably gone up—

Bob Clarkson: It’s 500 now.

JOHN CARTER: No, I cannot believe it is 500.

Bob Clarkson: It was in the media this morning.

JOHN CARTER: The member is kidding me! No, 500 people cannot be employed there; that is not possible. It was only 385 a couple of weeks ago. Oh, I suppose anything is possible under this Labour Government. The point is that most of the people who are there to advise the Government have not got much, if any, background in the building industry itself, and they misunderstand it.

Chris Tremain: Are these people builders?

JOHN CARTER: Well, some of them are builders; most of them are not. They would line up with Michael Cullen and have about as much expertise in building as he has.

Bob Clarkson: Sorry, John, were you talking about the ones who work in the department or the ones who are employed there?

JOHN CARTER: I am talking about just the ones who are employed in the department.

Bob Clarkson: Oh, not working?

JOHN CARTER: No. Here we go again with these speakers; something is echoing.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Marian Hobbs): No, I think it is your constant turning round.

JOHN CARTER: The tragedy is that we have this department that writes these rules and regulations, causing great costs in the industry and in fact even ensuring that some people will exit the building industry because they cannot stand all the rules and regulations. The local authorities have to match them, so the bureaucracy in the local authorities has increased significantly—25 percent in the last 9 years. Of course, that also adds in extra costs. If the system were working, then maybe one could defend it. But the real problem is that this bill is the fourth attempt at addressing the problem but it is not addressing it. We are still building leaky homes in this country today. Not only have we got the leaky home problem that we know about—and it is estimated and registered at the moment that that involves about 3,200 homes, but it is guesstimated that somewhere between 15,000 and 30,000 homes may well be found to be leaky in due course—but we are building more leaky homes today. That is the real tragedy; we are actually building more leaky homes right now. That is the problem. We have not fixed the problem. The Government has not fixed the problem. All it is doing is making more rules and regulations.

Some common sense should be applied instead of our saying to local authorities and ratepayers “You are responsible for the failure of building.” That is what happens: local government ends up being responsible when a building fails because the builders have generally exited the scene, the architects have usually gone, and the suppliers of materials cannot be pinged, so the last person standing is the local council. Of course, the council’s insurance company says to it: “Well, we will be a bit careful about how we back you on this.”, and the burden ends up going on to ratepayers. So ratepayers have become responsible for the failure of building in this country, and that is just wrong. It should not be the case. But this Government is not prepared to accept that. It says: “Oh well, if that is how it is, because councils have some role in inspecting these buildings, and therefore have some certification, councils should be the ones that are finally responsible. If there is no one else, we will load it on to ratepayers.” Quite honestly, that is just fundamentally wrong. It should not happen.

We should be saying to the Minister, and to the Department of Building and Housing: “Find a way of putting the responsibility back on to the building industry.” I can tell members that the building industry itself is asking to be made responsible for its buildings. It wants to be responsible for its buildings; it does not want all the rules and regulations. Those in the industry, or most of them, are quite capable of building good, sound, non-leaky—what is the word I am looking for?

Colin King: Weatherproof.

JOHN CARTER: —weatherproof; I thank the member very much—homes. They are quite capable of building something that is not only weatherproof but will last. Whether it is “weathertight” or “weatherproof” it does not matter; it will stop the blasted rain getting in. That is what we are talking about.

Most of those people in the building industry are quite capable. There are some tremendously skilled people in the industry. We should allow them to get on with the job. What we are doing instead of allowing that to happen is putting rules, regulations, and restrictions in their road that stop them actually getting on with the job.

I say to the Government that this bill will go through—unfortunately. It will add to the pile of red tape. It will add to costs and bureaucracy, because the Government will now have to put out more rules and regulations as a consequence. The Department of Building and Housing will already be out there—all 358, 500, or however many there are—writing rules and regulations. Local authorities will then have to read them and will have to try to employ somebody else to implement them.

Colin King: Some expert.

JOHN CARTER: Well, the trouble is that we have run out of experts; it will be just anybody who happens to be hanging around. I can see there might be some people leaving Parliament who might get a job in the Department of Building and Housing or in local government. Unfortunately, the tragedy of this situation is that the bill will not work. It will continue to fail. The builders know it will fail. I am sure that in their heart of hearts the people in the Department of Building and Housing know that it is not working. Certainly, the Minister in charge of this bill—if one speaks to him very carefully—will say it is not working. But unfortunately his Government is saying that this is the route down which we have to go. There is a bit of good news, however, that people will find out shortly, when they get a National Government and we fix this problem.

SUE KEDGLEY (Green) : I rise to say that the Green Party is very pleased to be supporting the Building Amendment Bill.

TE URUROA FLAVELL (Māori Party—Waiariki) : Tēnā koe, Madam Speaker. Kia ora tātou katoa e te Whare. I am pleased to take a call on this Building Amendment Bill. During the debate I have been thinking about who will benefit from this legislation. Although I know this House would be fascinated, I am not going to spend any time today on discussing the 45 minor amendments and technical drafting corrections related to the future setting of accreditation fees.

The bill makes minor changes to the Building Act 2004 that will improve the workability of the current regulatory framework. I want to spend some time on clause 10. This clause amends the content requirements for project information memoranda to include the need to have a statement on how buildings are complying with the disability access provisions of the building code. It reminds builders of the compliance requirements relating to access and facilities for people with disabilities.

It is more and more common that at any gathering of tangata whenua there will be a group of people whom we might refer to as the “Walking Frame Club”. I am talking about those of our people who are impaired or affected by conditions related to diabetes, gout, gangrene, hip fractures, hip and knee replacements, arthritis, and other factors that could slow us down—too much kina and pāua, they say. This bill is a step in the right direction for the “Walking Frame Club”. For far too many tangata whenua with disabilities, independence is compromised by buildings and access points that are simply too difficult to negotiate. Jutting edges, uneven surfaces, and obstacles make access to a building difficult.

It is great that the bill requires project information memoranda to include a reminder about access provisions for disabled people. This is of particular interest to us in the Māori Party as we know that for tangata whenua, adult disability rates are higher than national rates. One-third of Māori aged between 45-64 years report a disability, compared with one-quarter of the total population.

The litmus test of any access provisions is if the target groups respond positively. It was pleasing to see the National Assembly of People with Disabilities and CCS disability action support the amendments in the bill. Clause 10 provides for the requirement to show how buildings are complying with the disability access provisions of the building code, and that has to be good.

The other point I raise is around the process being followed in this House in supposedly improving the workability of the 2004 Building Act. We know that on the basis of the 30 submissions received, generally there has been strong support across the relevant industry groups. However, we also know that many of those 30 submitters raised concerns. The problem is that because there is no commentary on these issues in the Social Services Committee report to Parliament, it is very difficult to ascertain what issues have been addressed through recommended changes to the bill, what issues have been discussed but did not result in any recommended changes to the bill, and what issues have not been addressed at all.

Let me share an example. Concerns were raised by the Registered Master Builders Federation about the watering-down of the definition of restricted building work. Its view was that the weasel words made the building licensing scheme less practical and less certain. An amendment was then recommended by the committee that would seem to address these concerns, but it is difficult to ascertain its effect or how it is qualitatively different from the current wording in the Act given there is no commentary in the select committee report. The amendment specifies that restricted building work is building work that is critical to the integrity of a building—for example, its envelope and structure. One would think that the intention would be to make the definition more precise, yet the key words “critical” and “integrity” are not defined. That is pretty ironic given the purpose of the bill is to clarify the language and the rules relating to the licensing of building practitioners. The people working in the building industry need straightforward information on what licensing is about and what it will mean for them, and it needs to be in terms that do not leave any doubt.

In summary, let me build—excuse the pun—on the concepts I have raised. As a non-builder, I would be reliant on a licensed building practitioner to nail down a definition for me that one could hammer home. If the words “critical” and “integrity” are part of the foundations of a building practice, concepts that have a clear trade meaning, one would have thought it would be useful to define them in the glossary of this bill. If the basic architecture of the bill is “floored”, and paints us into a corner because of the cracks in understanding, no amount of putty applied during this late stage of the debate will seal it for us. We in the House need to step up.

R Doug Woolerton: Excellent!

TE URUROA FLAVELL: I thank Mr Woolerton. The concern for us, as a smaller party that does not have membership on the Social Services Committee, is that we are not in a good position to evaluate whether the amendments suggested are in keeping with the advice received. We want a level playing field—thank you for laughing, Madam Assistant Speaker; I appreciate that. We would have thought that the whole debate was a window of opportunity for framing some alterations to keep the builders building happily ever “rafter”, but is hard to see the wood for the trees in the final report of the select committee.

We have to, however, measure these issues up against the total design of the adjustments that will improve the safety of any future dam constructions, clarify the legal liability and accountability of licensed building practitioners, and give more detail around building consent exemptions. In drawing our comments to a close, we in the Māori Party will support this bill to ensure that we have appropriate diagrams and plans for success in the building and construction industry.