Williams Andrew: Building (Earthquake-prone Buildings) Amendment Bill — First ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeWilliams Andrew: Building (Earthquake-prone Buildings) Amendment Bill — First Reading[Sitting date: 05 March 2014. Volume:696;Page:16349. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]ANDREW WILLIAMS (NZ First): In relation to the Building (Earthquake-prone Buildings) Amendment Bill firstly I would like to acknowledge and appreciate the input from engineer John Scarry. Over the last week or so since starting with my speech Mr Scarry has provided some very good and considerable input into this issue. Secondly I would like to provide the definition of an earthquake-prone building. It is a building that “will have its ultimate capacity exceeded in a moderate earthquake”. If itshould “collapse in a moderate earthquake the collapse would be likely to cause—(i) injury or death” or “(ii) damage to any other property.” It can be constructed from any material. Further a moderate earthquake under that definition is an earthquake that is one-third the strength of but the same duration as the code-specified earthquake for a new building on the same site.The findings of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Building Failure Caused by the Canterbury Earthquakes are variable in quality which is understandable given the enormous task the commission was confronted with. Its recommendations with regard to earthquake-prone buildings must not be considered to be without flaw. The best evidence presented to the commission on the performance of strengthened and unstrengthened unreinforced masonry buildings in the Christchurch earthquake was provided by Mr Jason Ingham and Mr Michael Griffith. This clearly showed that strengthening to even 50 percent of new building standard has little effect on the performance of a building in an extreme code-level seismic event. Only strengthening to a minimum of 67 percent of new building standard does that. Strengthening up to 50 percent did not prevent complete destruction but that was in earthquakes that had short durations of intense shaking not 40 seconds or more as could be expected close to the main alpine fault line or in Wellington.This Building (Earthquake-prone Buildings) Amendment Bill is not about life safety in a code-level earthquake event. The performance of unreinforced masonry buildings in the Christchurch earthquakes shows that particularly in earthquakes with a long duration of intense shaking even buildings strengthened to 50 percent of new building standard suffered heavy or major damage or were destroyed. Therefore what is expected to be gained in a major earthquake if the level of strengthening required is only just above 34 percent? The term “new building standard” really applies only to the percentage of code loading. The assessment of existing buildings’ seismic strength in accordance with the New Zealand Society for Earthquake Engineering “Red Book” of 2006 is done on a much less conservative basis than that used for the design of new buildings. This means that a building that is at 34 percent of the new building standard has only about 25 percent or less of the strength of a competently designed new building. If we require a new building to have the equivalent of 100 percent code performance in order to achieve its life safety function in a code-level seismic event what performance can we honestly expect of a building that has its strength equivalent to only 25 percent of current code performance?This bill clarifies that once a building is classed as earthquake-prone it need be strengthened only to be marginally above 34 percent of the new building standard to no longer be earthquake-prone. So why would we even bother? One of the very few useful aspects of the Building Act 2004 was a much more realistic treatment of earthquake-prone buildings. The one-third new building standard cut-off was used then as a means of identifying the most at-risk buildings and it was then to be up to the local authority to determine what level of strengthening was required. The building stock that this bill is meant to deal with is enormous and varied—a very large number of buildings of extremely varied type use and location. These buildings were in the main designed without the slightest regard to seismic loading and have materials and structural details that are the worst possible from the point of view of achieving robust seismic performance.The value of this building stock is enormous the cost of strengthening or replacing it is immense and the resources required to assess and strengthen it are formidable. It is essential that the Minister for Building and Construction and the Local Government and Environment Committee which is dealing with this bill not go through the motions to simply rubber stamp it but rather to treat every submission on its merits in order tolead to an Act that has the scope and flexibility to deal with the diversity of building stock throughout New Zealand.Main streets throughout New Zealand will be greatly affected by the measures in this bill. The effects on provincial New Zealand will be huge. Many building owners simply will not be in a financial position to undertake the required upgrades. Main streets all over the country will literally be driven out of existence. What will that do for our provincial economies? Has full consideration been given to a reasonable compromise to help protect lives in the event of a sizable earthquake such as for instance initially concentrating on checking and strengthening verandahs over pavements which is where many people died in the Christchurch earthquake? Also has the Government looked into the likes of tax concessions and other subsidies to support the landlords who will be required to strengthen these buildings? This will impose a huge cost to New Zealanders throughout New Zealand in terms of commercial and other buildings. This could be crippling for the economy. We New Zealand First are concerned that perhaps the Government has not thought this through fully and that main street New Zealand particularly in small towns and small provincial areas will be up for a huge cost.With regard to the Government’s scheme to contribute 25 percent to leaky building repairs it was widely stated that this could have cost the Government $1 billion if this had been taken up in full but by the time GST direct PAYE and company profit tax were considered the actual cost to the Government was almost nil. That was without considering all the GST and tax as a result of the economic multiplier that came from the economic activity from fixing the leaky buildings. Similarly New Zealand First is of the view that if we are going to go down this track and require landlords throughout New Zealand to bring their earthquake-prone buildings up to a higher standard there must be some compensation to landlords there must be some concessions and there must be some way that the Government would support this going on because the economic effects and the work that will be generated as a result of this will be considerable and therefore the tax that results from the PAYE GST company taxes and other aspects will be considerable. The Government needs to take that into account.The 4 September 2010 earthquake in Christchurch may have acted as a safety valve by damaging and making off limits many earthquake-prone buildings that would have otherwise caused numerous fatalities on 22 February 2011. However it is a fact that over 70 percent of the fatalities on 22 February were caused not by the collapse of earthquake-prone buildings but by the collapse of two earthquake-risk buildings namely the CTV Building and the Pyne Gould building which were rated later to be at 40 percent and 50 percent of the new building standard respectively. Therefore New Zealand First urges that we do not try to impose something across the whole of New Zealand perhaps as a result of what happened in Christchurch but we look at this as it goes to the select committee and that the Government does indeed listen to the experts in this matter so that we do not go down the wrong path and impose huge costs on the whole of New Zealand.