Jones Shane: Building Amendment Bill (No 3) — First Reading 
Jones Shane: Building Amendment Bill (No 3) — First Reading 
[Volume:669;Page:16065] 
Hon SHANE JONES (Labour) 
: 
 Kia ora ano tatou Mr Speaker. Just to bring the previous speaker Nikki Kaye up to speed the bill she was referring to has already been dealt with. That bill pertained to the leaky homes problem. I can assure the member that everyone who spoke from her side of the House had less to say than she did. 
A number of people have suggested that the Building Act ought to be put into the furnace. 
Aaron Gilmore 
: Fast-forward that one. 
Hon SHANE JONES 
: Oh hold on that was Aaron Gilmore. He used the words “funereal pyre”. What he was actually referring to is the struggle that he and Paul Quinn will have to get hold of the lifebuoy as they are thrown off the sinking ship of Te Roopu Nahinara. Paul Quinn will say: “I need to get it because I have protected us from prisoners who now are unable to vote.” Aaron Gilmore will say: “I need to get it because I am the cleverest financial analyst who has ever come to Parliament.” But that is kei te pai because Sammy Wong and his hovercraft will save both of them. 
Aaron Gilmore 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I am mildly offended that Paul Quinn is being treated in such a poor way given that he is not in this House right now. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Eric Roy) 
: Well the member has actually breached a Standing Order ruling by referring to the absence of people from the House. I feel that we should just get on with the debate. 
Hon SHANE JONES 
: This legislation is about reforming the Building Act. I am not entirely sure whether it will relate to sow crates but I can see a Minister over there who has ruined the agricultural portfolio worsened the liability of the Crown and incurred an inordinate debt as he sought to offend the members of an important religious community in New Zealand who just want to go about their lives and eat kosher meat. He has introduced some foolish regulations. But I will come back to that another time. The man is a walking liability. He has probably endangered the larger meat trade but the terms “head” and “meat” tend to come together when one looks at him. 
This bill is an improvement in terms of what took place and what a number of us on our side of the House—too late in the piece I might say—endeavoured to arrest. That is why a number of us have spoken enthusiastically about it tonight and why 10 minutes at the very least is required to elaborate as to what the bill actually means given that no one on that side of the House has either read it or— 
Aaron Gilmore 
: Get the sure strokes Shane. 
Hon SHANE JONES 
: I tell Mr Gilmore to keep all his energy for the lifebuoy. Well in his case I had better say the safety belt. 
However I come back to the bill. There will be four new categories of building permits. A lot of building activity in New Zealand should not require a permit of any sort and I sought to do that in the period of time that I was Minister. Some very modest insubstantial building activities ought to be able to be carried out without a permit provided that the person is a credible and qualified tradesman. Why on earth should ratepayers be blighted with the costs of having to deal with permits and consents for building activities that are of a modest nature? That is why the schedule that was passed 2 years ago allowed certain building activities to be exempted. I must say that this bill continues slightly in that vein. It focuses the attention of decision makers on where risk really lies. Councils ought to be concerned about those projects where the risk is of a very substantial and significant nature. 
Councils will not be issuing certificates of compliance; they will be issuing completion certificates. That will reflect the fact that when a person makes an application the process has been completed. Owners have a responsibility not only to use common sense but to act as investors and owners of property and find tradesmen who are qualified and reliable. This bill brings a suitable level of responsibility on to the applicant and on to the person who actually owns the property. Then it sheets home the responsibility to those such as the designers. Those fools who brought cheek by jowl Mediterranean-style housing into New Zealand have got off largely scot-free and have concluded that they are no longer liable and are no longer responsible. But this bill provides for the liability that they should face to be borne by them and requires them to ensure that the advice they give is consistent with the requirements of the building code. 
The building code was originally a permissive experience but it got far too liberal and problems emerged during the period of time prior to the Helen Clark Government. Our response as my colleagues have said was a very heavy-handed response and we all agree that this bill should go to the Local Government and Environment Committee because the pendulum most certainly needs to swing back to a place where people are not overwhelmed by too much red tape and are not paying absurdly high levels of fees to the council when the problem that needs to be managed is of a very simple nature. 
An important part of this lies at the heart of the average Kiwi citizen’s experience of owning their own property—that is the owner-builder exemption. Earlier this was a matter of some debate. How does one allow for the average Kiwi do-it-yourself Carter Holt Harvey - ITM friend who keeps those businesses in regular cash flow by wanting to improve and actually enrich the value of their properties? This bill will allow that to happen. However where activity requires a high level of skill because one may impair the integrity of the building there will be an obligation on the owners of the property to ensure that the people doing that work include a suitably qualified person. Without a doubt that will not pertain to Skyline garages and garden-variety straightforward—I will not say ticky-tack—modest dwellings. I do believe that under this bill those things can happen with a great deal of speed. 
The difficulty underlying all of these changes is that the building industry is on its knees. The building industry is losing talent and qualified people to Australia. The building industry is not able to raise the necessary levels of capital because the buying market has lost confidence. In addition to that although population changes are taking place and the number of people requiring new dwellings and new residences is geometrically increasing the difficulty is that the supply side is constrained—indeed in some cases it is static. That is the deeper problem. Recently representatives from the building industry said to Prime Minister Key that unless he was capable of bringing forward an intervention there would be no building industry left. The big end of town got taken care of; the Fletchers etc. have been given a lifeline through the role they are playing in the reconstruction of Canterbury. But the essence of the building industry is the person with a four-wheel drive two or three largely blokes a dog on the back and some simple tools. That is the garden variety everyday Kiwi enterprise in the building industry. We are losing them because there is a fear or a complete unwillingness on the Government side of the House in terms of economic policy to inject capital and confidence into this sector. Somehow members opposite imagine that the hidden hand of Adam Smith is going to rise and cause economic activity to enjoy a greater elevation. That is not going to happen. More apprentices are going to be turned away there are going to be more difficulties and we are going to watch a greater drift of our young people to Australia. 
The challenge is for—[ 
Interruption 
] I say to Mr Carter that he has created enough liability for the Crown. He has enraged the most frightening Aucklander Michael Stiassny. We know that Mr Carter now requires a handholding experience by Crown Law to avoid any further liability being incurred as a consequence of his delinquency on the part of the Crown. Michael Stiassny is coming for him make no doubt about that as a consequence of his enraging and alienating that valuable part of the religious community of Auckland otherwise known as the Jewish community.