Catchpole Brent: Building Bill — In Committee Procedure 
Catchpole Brent: Building Bill — In Committee Procedure 
[Volume:619;Page:14854] 
BRENT CATCHPOLE (NZ First) 
: 
 I would like to follow on from a couple of points I was making earlier to do with the licensing of building practitioners and the register. One of the issues I mentioned was to do with phoenix companies. A very good point was made in the  
Independent 
 on 21 July. One of its articles stated that the bill fails to curb shonky property developers. It pointed out that this bill does not deal with that issue and New Zealand First agrees with that. John Scarry also indicated that one way to solve the problem—and it is quite a simple one to do with the licensing of building practitioners—is to license not just individuals and not just individual developers but the companies. If we license the companies we have the key to stopping the phoenix companies from appearing because if they do not come up to the standards they will lose their licence and they cannot just form a new company and expect it to be licensed overnight. They would have to prove to the industry that they are a worthwhile company and a worthwhile business. So that is one simple means of solving the problem of the phoenix companies. But this bill sadly did not take that extra step and license the companies including development companies and building companies. That would have solved a lot of the problems. 
Others have talked about the fly-by-nighters. This bill stops the fly-by-nighters— 
Brian Connell 
: How? 
BRENT CATCHPOLE 
: It is simple: someone cannot just get a licence to build one particular structure. So someone cannot just walk in and say he or she wants to develop a project. 
Brian Connell 
: So the home builder is gone. 
BRENT CATCHPOLE 
: No the home builder is not gone; the home builder is quite able to continue. It is just the fly-by-nighters who come into the industry to build a structure and then disappear who will be affected. They are like the phoenix companies but if they are licensed then they cannot just disappear. If they want to continue to practise they have to keep up their standards. Otherwise they will lose their licences. 
Brian Connell 
: How are you going to police it? 
BRENT CATCHPOLE 
: Well there is a simple way to police it. If we have the register—which some members were complaining about—it will show that a member is able to take on the structures that he or she is licensed to build. 
The other part of the issue is the extra cost which other members have been complaining about. They have been saying it is just an extra compliance cost but it is not. It is an insurance policy to make sure that the public gets a builder who is capable of doing the job and doing it properly—so that people are not stuck with a house that is substandard and is likely to end up as a leaky home. The leaky homes problem came about because people were taking short cuts purely because they were trying to trim costs for developers. The developers screwed down the prices and the costs and therefore this measure is an insurance policy. 
Other members have mentioned the shortage of builders and the need to keep semi-retired builders—the ones who are reaching the end of their working lives—involved. Shane Ardern mentioned those semi-retired builders having a young person beside them as an apprentice. That does not happen these days and it will not happen as long as the Government has an apprenticeship scheme that is without that practical side and that does not encourage older workers and businesses to take on apprentices. We have to have the support mechanisms and incentives in order for businesses to take on apprentices. Otherwise they will not take them on we will continue to have a reduction in the workforce and as the older builders get to the end of their working lives we will not have the younger people coming through to replace them.