O'Connor DamienHon DAMIEN O'CONNOR (Labour—West Coast - Tasman): Thank you Mr Chairman—I am focusing on the right part of the bill this time. I appreciate that the Government is attempting here of course to put in place something that is very sound in policy—that is that there should be some ultimate payment for sign-off I guess when a contract is complete. One of the things that I struggle to see in here of course is the threshold at which that sign-off should occur. One of the still unresolved issues across the whole of the building industry is that of quality. In fact I had a meeting this afternoon actually with the Plumbers Gasfitters and Drainlayers Board and a representative from the electricians and from the builders themselves saying that the regimes they have—and the plumbers themselves are getting I think to a good space. But with electricians and builders they are not yet in a space where they can guarantee that a house or an apartment or whatever when finished is actually up to standard—for a whole lot of reasons.In spite of the best attempts I guess by councils—the territorial local authorities—and industry scrutinising themselves the fact is that we do not have legislation that backs that up to the point where we can guarantee that when this withheld payment—the retention—gets paid over on completion of the contracts that actually all of the parties will be satisfied. So I support the retentions provision in this bill but if we think that is going to solve a lot of issues we are kidding ourselves.I think there will ultimately be debates that arise from—well the work might have been done but to what standard? And if it lasts for 1 year is that sufficient for a complete job? Or indeed as some are saying a 10-year work guarantee on a property—and it should be that. In fact it should be 20 years. If you went to Europe it would be a 30-year guarantee on the quality of workmanship—and the fact that when the contracts are completed between the parties then everyone has done what they are contracted to do and have done it to the standard that protects ultimately the person who is purchasing the property or paying the money for it.So I cannot see anything in here that clarifies the threshold beyond which the parties will have to reach—that is doing the work is OK but you have to do the work to a certain standard and at that time the retention money will be paid over as it should be for a job well done. So I acknowledge—and I think one of my colleagues acknowledged—the Hon Clayton Cosgrove for his work in bringing this in. I think it has been an innovative policy but ensuring that the money is not taken—and with all the best intentions of Parliament there are too many examples of where good ideas end up with money being rorted or with people running away with what is other people's money in effect.So I say that this provision is a good one in principle but the unresolved issue is the one of what quality of work should be required before the final sign-off on any project occurs. Is it from the person paying for the house or is it the company that is contracted to build the house for example or is it one of the sub-contractors to one of their subbies? There are a whole lot of layers in the building industry. As was pointed out to me this afternoon they all operate with different levels of accountability and scrutiny and some of them are not very good I have to say. I think it is something that the Government and I am sure the next Labour Government after September will look into—Hon Amy Adams: 2023.Hon DAMIEN O'CONNOR: —because it is urgently needed. Unlike the Minister over there we believe that people buying houses should know that they are getting what they have paid for. The deregulation under the National Government in the 1990s has seen the leaky homes catastrophe—there is no other word for it—where tens of thousands of New Zealanders lost billions of dollars in assets that they purchased. They are worth considerably less because they are simply not up to standard. And we have to in Opposition ensure that every piece of legislation related to this improves the situation and does not simply exacerbate it.In our enthusiasm to pass this legislation through and facilitate this we cannot be naive enough to believe that by changing contract law and the retentions—and I guess amending the Construction Contracts Act 2002—we are now going to be all sorted. There are many many things to be done and I seek from the Minister and other members over there some assurance that they will look at that issue of threshold and quality. I know there are only a few more months left of their tenure but it would be something to offer the people of New Zealand as they go to the election because they have not done anything. We know of situations in Auckland in particular where substandard building is occurring every single day with little or no scrutiny.So although we have sorted out or we are sorting out the method of final payment—it is right that someone should withhold payment until the completion of a job and it is right that when it is completed to a standard that payment should be made and the money should not go missing. That is what we are doing here. But ultimately the threshold has not been clarified in law and in the areas of plumbing and gasfitting and the provision of electricity through a house—and we have now got of course issues of IT and fibre-optic and very very technical issues around housing—there will need to be standards set there so the people who pay substantial amounts of money in the belief they are getting a good system simply do not get ripped off. I say that we support the progress of this bill but there is still a long way to go in the area of housing for New Zealanders.