Tisch Lindsay: Legislation (Incorporation by Reference) Bill — In Committee 
Tisch Lindsay: Legislation (Incorporation by Reference) Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:625;Page:19819] 
LINDSAY TISCH (National—Piako) 
: 
 National as members will be aware opposed the Building Act. We did so because as we said at the time it was very prescriptive legislation. We said that there were issues in it that were over the top. Although we acknowledged that there were deficiencies in the Building Act 1991 we also made it very clear that the cumbersome approach that was to be adopted would put huge compliance costs on how the industry worked. We also said that because of the change from inspecting properties to supervising properties we would see huge costs associated with any building but mainly with the building of residential homes. 
It is interesting that at that time we acknowledged there would be ongoing problems with this legislation and here we are 12 days after the Act came into effect—it came into effect on 1 April April Fool’s Day—making significant changes to legislation that one would have thought it having had the scrutiny of the committee at the time and submissions having been received on it the Government would get right. Supplementary Order Paper 361 which has been tabled really says that the Government got it wrong stuffed up and is bringing it back under urgency to fix it up. Well that is completely unacceptable. This is an $18 billion industry. The Government needed to spend the time hear the submissions and take into account all the points that were articulated at the select committee. National was well represented on that committee with Shane Ardern and myself. We said that the bill would not work. 
Now the Government is abusing the process dealing with this legislation under urgency. I want to know why this Supplementary Order Paper will not be referred to the select committee if it is so important. If it is so important that we should be debating it under urgency in order to fix up a mess that National members identified last year would be created then we believe that it is incumbent on the Government to say to the industry and everybody involved in it: “Let’s look at it again. Let’s get it right. Let’s hear submissions.” That is our position and it is the reason why we will not be supporting this legislation’s progress. 
Clause 3C on Supplementary Order Paper 361 is concerned with dams and section 14(2) in it states: “If a building includes a dam—(a) the regional authority is responsible for performing functions under this Act relating to the dam; and (b) the building consent authority and territorial authority are responsible for performing functions under this Act relating to the parts of the building that are not a dam.” When is a dam not a dam? When it is in a damned bill like this I guess! We visited a dam on the Waitaki River. What was in place there—the emergency procedures and the monitoring of construction and of safety aspects of the dam—required expertise that far outweighed anything that any regional council or local territorial authority would have. Those councils do not have the expertise but the people working on that dam do. Their stringent safety precautions the functions and policies they have in place would far outweigh any expertise that any regional council would have. So one would have to question why that sort of provision is included in the Supplementary Order Paper. National members are very clear in our minds that these things were tidied up at the time. 
Clause 3L on the same Supplementary Order Paper repeals and replaces section 116B of the principal Act. This is the point that my colleague Dr Nick Smith has been talking about specifically. Subsection (1) makes it an offence to use a building “for a use for which the building is not safe or not sanitary;” or if it has “inadequate means of escape from fire.” Subsection (3) creates a penalty: “A person who commits an offence under this section is liable to a fine not exceeding $100000 and in the case of a continuing offence to a further fine not exceeding $10000 for every day or part of a day during which the offence has continued.” Who has the sort of money in their pockets to be able to pay the exorbitant fines that this bill envisages? The select committee heard from the Far North District Council that a lot of the houses in its region do not meet codes of compliance. The figure escapes me but there are thousands of properties that should not be occupied because they do not meet codes of compliance. Will we pull the plug on those property owners? Will we say that they should not be living in their houses because they do not meet a code of compliance? 
Those houses probably do not even have consents. That is the issue as we said earlier on in this debate. There will be a move from do-it-yourself operators not to go through the stringent provisions that the current Act allows and they will bypass the system. In fact there is an article in the  
National Business Review 
— 
Darren Hughes 
: A fine paper. 
LINDSAY TISCH 
: It has a very fine member’s photo in it as well. This issue is dated 16 July 2004. The point I made in this article is that the Government was putting another nail in home improvement. That is what it says and that is exactly the sort of issue— 
Darren Hughes 
: Good publicity. 
LINDSAY TISCH 
: While the member carries on he should know that this is a serious issue. I suggest he takes a call to crystallise and articulate the Government’s position because at the moment this legislation is a sham. It is a complete and utter waste of time. The point is that if the Government had got the legislation right in the first place we would not be back here now under urgency trying to sort out the issue. It is so important in National’s view that the legislation should be back before the select committee to let the people who will be affected by the legislation have a say. 
I have another article entitled “The Building Bill”. It also has photos of members. The point was made in it very clearly that as New Zealanders we pride ourselves on our practical ability to do our own thing. We have that mentality. We can knock down a wall tile a bathroom strip a door build a deck—no worries. But this legislation means that those provisions will be taken away. This Supplementary Order Paper goes over the top in trying to correct some mistakes that have been made. 
As Dr Smith has said the provisions in the Act in its current form are not being carried through. Clause 3T substitutes section 363 of the principal Act with several new sections. This matter has been talked about in previous debates. The new section 363 is about “Protecting safety of members of public using premises open to public or intended for public use”. Dr Smith has said that if the law as it is written were being carried out we should not be using the Beehive because of the construction work that is going on at this time. So there is abuse of the system and that makes a mockery of the Act which we spent time on. National members articulated those issues at the time. Now a bill has come in under urgency 12 days after the principal Act was enacted to try to correct these issues. 
Well our position is very clear. We are opposing this bill. If Government members think the issue is so important that we need to look at it more closely why is there not a separate bill? Why do we not have a Building Amendment Bill to tidy it up? This bill is the Legislation (Incorporation by Reference) Bill. It is a means to slip through the back door a Supplementary Order Paper to tidy up the mess of the Building Act and that should not be happening. If these issues are so important why is there not an amendment to the Building Act which was passed last year? 
If we take it further than that we see the disarray that this Government is in. Over the last 5 years seven ministers have been responsible for the building industry. 
Hon Ken Shirley 
: Seven? 
LINDSAY TISCH 
: That is right; seven ministers have been responsible for the building industry. Where is the continuity? Where is the focus when there are different people in charge who do not understand the industry who have no idea what it is about and who have never been at the coalface?