Willis NicolaBUILDING AMENDMENT BILLSecond ReadingDebate resumed from 9 May.NICOLA WILLIS (National): From the profoundly moving to the what I'm sure will be somewhat less profound but still important issues of the Building Amendment Bill. This is a bill that National supports and I want to start by thanking the Transport and Infrastructure Committee which has worked on it in particular our great members Matt King Alastair Scott and the very fine Tim van de Molen. I thank the members in particular because what this bill does—and it is a piece of legislation that represents work of the previous National Government—is it deals with issues that involve really difficult clashes of people's relative rights. The bill of course seeks to amend the laws as they relate to how buildings are managed after an emergency and to allow for proper investigation by Government authorities of any weaknesses in buildings and how we could prevent those in the future.This is all very real stuff for us here in Wellington. We saw after the Kaikōura earthquake—and I know my colleagues in Canterbury saw before us—the devastating damage that major earthquakes can do and the consequential issues for building owners. These issues can be particularly acute in the immediate days following a disaster and there are difficult decisions to be made. This legislation provides much clearer guidance about how those decisions are made so as to protect life.You have people wanting to get access to their personal property and business records sometimes in buildings that are perfectly safe but there's a building next door that's not safe. How do we ensure that we protect people's lives but also ensure that where appropriate they are able to make access?You also have engineers in the immediate aftermath of earthquakes working incredibly hard long hours having to make dozens of critical decisions in order to provide authorities good advice about what should be done with buildings which should be demolished and when. Again this bill clarifies matters and provides good guidance to decision makers.Here in Wellington I know that one of the complex issues we need to be prepared for and that I am pleased this bill creates certainty around is the issue of complex body corporate structures where you can have private property owners who may take offence at officials having powers to demolish their most valuable asset. You add to that the mix of heritage issues and the inherent emotional stresses that people are under post an earthquake and that can be an explosive mix of competing interests.So as I said I thank the members of the committee who clearly have worked in a constructive way to balance these competing rights and interests and come up with a piece of legislation that can be supported by both sides of the House.The two areas that the bill covers of course are distinct. One is around improving the system for managing buildings immediately after an emergency—as I've detailed—but the other is to provide the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment (MBIE) additional powers to investigate building failures. This is the part of the bill that I see as very important for our future because what it ensures is that MBIE where it has concerns about structural issues underlying issues in buildings has extensive powers to investigate failures and the reason those extensive powers are important is it allows officials to learn the lessons for the future of what other failures could be anticipated.We of course have seen that here in Wellington with the failure of Statistics House where we saw that learnings were taken—actually I prefer lessons"; we won't call them learnings—about pre-cast concrete floors. What we know is really important is that when we understand new things about the way the buildings may perform under the stress of an earthquake we use that to create guidance for the future. This bill gives clarity to MBIE that it has the powers to make those investigations and make recommendations for the future.I'd note in commending this bill to the House that we here on the National side are hopeful that there will be more building legislation coming through this House because there are certainly some pressing issues with skill shortages product certification issues consent issues and the collapse of many construction companies. We note that this is the only piece of legislation that the Minister has brought to the House in the 18 months since being appointed to the portfolio and hope for much more. Thank you Madam Deputy Speaker."