Heatley Phil: Building (Earthquake-prone Buildings) Amendment Bill — First ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeHeatley Phil: Building (Earthquake-prone Buildings) Amendment Bill — First Reading[Sitting date: 13 February 2014. Volume:696;Page:15966. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon PHIL HEATLEY (National—Whangarei): I rise in support of the Building (Earthquake-prone Buildings) Amendment Bill. This bill is sponsored by the Hon Maurice Williamson the Minister for Building and Construction whom we heard from recently. He made it very clear that the purpose of the bill is to introduce a nationally consistent system for managing earthquake-prone buildings that strikes a balance between what he said was protecting people from harm in an earthquake and managing the cost of strengthening or removing buildings.We all understand that it would be great to have perfect buildings—gold-plating and everything structurally sound so that it is 100 times more than what is required—but of course costs do come into play. So what National is ensuring is that earthquake-prone buildings are dealt with in a timely manner by way of a nationally consistent system and not before time. This needs to strike a balance between protecting people from harm and managing the costs as I said.We are also ensuring that information about earthquake-prone buildings is made available to the public. That is particularly important as the public have become increasingly conscious of this due to the Christchurch earthquakes and much of the earth movement that we have seen in Wellington and other parts of the country in recent years. They do now ask the question about the earthquake resistance of buildings and they want the information.The amendments proposed in this bill require territorial authorities to undertake a seismic capacity assessment of existing non-residential buildings and multi-storey and multi-unit residential buildings in their district within 5 years of commencement. In some parts of the country of course this has happened. In many parts of the country in fact it is an ongoing process because they are particularly earthquake-prone. I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate Wellington City Council for example which is well on top of its understanding of what it means to be earthquake-prone in this city and what is required to meet that challenge.The amendments also provide for a register of information on the seismic capacity of buildings to be held by the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment and they clarify the current threshold for defining an earthquake-prone building including stating that it applies to parts of buildings as well as the whole building.On that note I would like to state clearly as the Minister has what an earthquake-prone building is. In this bill as is said in new subpart 6A “A building is earthquake-prone … if having regard to its condition and to the ground on which it is built and because of its construction (a) the building will have its ultimate capacity exceeded in a moderate earthquake (as defined in regulations); and (b) if the building were to collapse in a moderate earthquake the collapse would be likely to cause (i) injury or death topersons in the building or to persons on any other property; or (ii) damage to any other property.” So if those two benchmarks if you like are breached then that is what is considered to be an earthquake-prone building. Once that is identified of course the bill goes on to lead councils on how they should deal with it.So I support this bill because it does clarify the current threshold for defining an earthquake-prone building. It clarifies the level of work required for earthquake-prone buildings so the building or that part of the building that is earthquake-prone is no longer earthquake-prone. Essentially that is what is required to be done. In some buildings it might take considerable work to reach that standard; in others it might just be minor alterations. In any case I am sure engineers will have their say and be held to account for the decisions that they make.The bill requires work on existing earthquake-prone buildings to be undertaken within a single national time frame which is within 20 years of the legislation taking effect i.e. there is to be an assessment by territorial authorities within 5 years and work completed within 15 years of assessment. So once the bill takes effect within 5 years councils will have to notify owners make sure they are clear and clarify what is required from owners of earthquake-prone buildings and that the work is to be completed within 15 years.It is going to provide for work on priority buildings to be defined in the regulations and for exemption from requirements to undertake work for certain buildings. So the bill is wide ranging. It deals with issues that have not been dealt with in the past. I am pleased this is happening along with the other changes in the Building Act that the Minister has brought forward in recent years. I congratulate him on it and I look forward to the debate in the House and improvements in the select committee.