Bayly AndrewANDREW BAYLY (National—Hunua): Thank you. It's a pleasure to be speaking on this third reading of the Building Amendment Bill. I congratulate the Minister Jenny Salesa for bringing this bill through the House—her first bill and that's very good in terms of the building and construction sector. I also acknowledge my colleague the former Minister for Building and Construction the Hon Dr Smith who's sitting here behind me as the person who actually initiated this bill.I think it's very important to realise that this bill did have its genesis with the National Party and it's good that the Government's carried it on into fruition and I thank the Minister for that. As she has noted this is about dealing with those situations where there's been a tremendous and terrible act. It may be a seismic act or something that's really created mayhem. It is very important at that point that the public is kept safe from walking near those buildings that may have been damaged; also that the occupants of those buildings are kept safe. They may be tenants such as people living in apartments but also may be business tenants. Then you've got the rights of the private people who may own those buildings and all of those rights come together in a time of mayhem where there are competing claims there are competing interests but the primary thing is about making sure that everyone is safe. The important thing about this bill is that in making sure that we look after these buildings and come up with ways of dealing with them when there has been such an event the disruption is kept to an absolute minimum.This bill makes some amendments both to the Civil Defence Emergency Management Act but also to the Search and Surveillance Act. So it's not just about the bill itself. It has about three or four key parts to it. First of all it talks about a responsible person. This is the person who has the right to go in and either put a notice on a building or require demolition or whatever—quite extensive powers. Those responsible persons are defined as local authorities or people who are acting under the guidance of the Minister. What they will do is they should—and I note this in section 133BN(c) of the bill—result in minimal restriction of [an individual] to continue to use and occupy property and any restriction of that ability should be for no longer than is reasonably necessary:".The other parts of the powers are the power actually to enter these damaged buildings and also work to reduce or remove the risk. What the Transport and Infrastructure Committee considered was allocating different approaches for different levels of risk. In section 133BU there are three levels of risk specified. One is the urgent works when there's obviously immediate danger and things need to be done very very promptly and that may mean a street closure; it may mean a total ban on entering the building; it may even mean quite a curtilage around that building if for instance it was in the process or could possible fall.Then there's the second category which is it works to remove or reduce other risks. So this is the next layer down. The building's still standing but there might be parapets or balconies or there's damage around the building or materials lying around that building that need to be removed and they need to be removed promptly.Then the third level of risk covers works for long-term use or occupation of building. So this is in that phase where you're now looking to reoccupy the building as quickly as possible. Then there's the real point about this bill. What we do want to see under this bill is to see the opportunity to learn from failures—when buildings fail as a result of seismic events. The classic is the Statistics House down on the waterfront in Wellington where it was going through a period of repair but two floors collapsed. The opportunity to go in and learn around that and to be able to assess those dangers and also use that information as a way to make sure other buildings that are of a similar design are made safe. We've seen that already as a result of Statistics House where the footings on the hollow-core floors were too small—50 millimetres—and currently in many buildings across the country and particularly here in Wellington the footings that hold or support those hollow-core floors are being extended to make them safe in the event of a significant seismic activity.So I think we've talked about this bill a lot. It's a good piece of legislation. It's reasonable. We've been very mindful of making sure that the rights of individuals and owners and occupiers are protected and to minimise the level of disruption. I also just want to say thank you to the committee and also to the officials that worked with us on this bill and I commend the bill to the House."