Twyford Phil: Weathertight Homes Resolution Services Amendment Bill — In CommitteeText is subject to correctionTwyford Phil: Weathertight Homes Resolution Services Amendment Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 10 February 2016. Volume:711;Page:8900. Text is subject to correction.]PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū): It is good to recommence this debate on the Weathertight Homes Resolution Services Amendment Bill. The people at home who have been following the progress of this bill very closely through the House will be much relieved that the debate has recommenced. They will remember that Labour is supporting this bill because we want to see this final bit of fine-tuning of the Weathertight Homes Resolution Services funding assistance package. We want to see the benefits of the fine-tuning contained in this bill actually realised in the few months that remain before this bill expires.Before we were so rudely interrupted by the passage of time we were debating Part 2 of this bill and I want to direct the Committee’s attention to an element in Part 2 that deals with the widening of the definition of “qualifying claimant” in section 125B(1) of the principal Act. This provision is one of three important elements in the bill and this one particularly updates the Act in accordance with the Supreme Court ruling in Osborne v Auckland Council.People who have been following this issue will know that John and Helen Osborne had been denied access to the funding assistance package on a technicality and they took their case through the system all the way to the Supreme Court arguing that the 10-year limitation on leaky building claims should start from when the building is issued with a code compliance certificate by the council not when the building itself is physically completed. Because the terminology in the Act refers to the 10-year period kicking in from when the house is built that is a vagueness that subsequently tripped up a lot of people.The courts initially ruled that the Osbornes were not eligible for the funding assistance under the Act. Good for the Osbornes—they took that fight on. They won in the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court agreed with them that the 10-year limitation period—that the clock should start ticking from the moment that the code compliance certificate was issued. As a result of that the Government estimates that perhaps 300 families could benefit.I want to talk through one particular element. It is not a major issue but concern was raised by some submitters that the bill would have the unintended consequence of making it very difficult for some applicants who have gone ahead and made the repairs on their home after having been turned down for eligibility for the funding assistance package in that they would not then be eligible. Once the bill was passed allowing for the Osborne principle to be enacted these people having gone ahead and acted and done the repairs would no longer be eligible.So let me just talk through some of that detail. The bill deemed the owners who were regarded as ineligible based on the case law prior to the Osborne case to be eligible. It basically just deemed them eligible based on the Osborne principle. That is basically about correcting an injustice arising from an incorrect application of the law.The problem is that if owners had gone ahead and made their repairs to their house they still would not be able to obtain financial assistance under these provisions because they still would be unable to meet the contribution criteria which is one of the two key elements they have to meet. What section 125C of the principal Act does is it allows owners who are qualifying claimants to apply to obtain financial assistance. They have got to have an eligible claim. They have got to meet certain contribution criteria set out in the Gazette notice.Section 166(5) in clause 7 still requires those owners who have made the repairs—they have gone ahead having been deemed ineligible—to meet the status of qualifying claimant in all other respects. But that is not possible in the case of people who have gone ahead and repaired their homes. That was raised by submitters including the New Zealand Law Society who feared that this was an unintended consequence when there was no good reason to deny these people access to the assistance scheme. The Government has estimated that there would be about an extra 70 families in that position. As Paul Grimshaw of Grimshaw and Co. said at the Local Government and Environment Committee this would essentially require a number of these people to undertake lengthy and possibly expensive adjudication to get their result.What I would ask is for the Minister in the chair the Hon Nick Smith who is the Minister responsible for this bill—which is good for this debate—to get up and explain to us whether in fact the change that the select committee made to the bill in section 166(4) in clause 7 was designed to remedy that unintended consequence. I was not on the select committee. It is not clear to me from the reading that it is but I would invite the Minister to get up and explain whether or not those concerns have been met in this case.