Hayes John: Building Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Hayes John: Building Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:643;Page:13273] 
JOHN HAYES (National—Wairarapa) 
: 
 Thank you Mr Chair for allowing me to speak on this matter. It is of extreme importance to constituents in the Wairarapa electorate. I would like to bring to the attention of the Committee a number of examples of the sorts of costs the massive Resource Management Act brings to individuals in my community. Before I address that I would just like to say how deeply disappointed I am that the star of the Labour Party the up-and-coming Shane Jones has been made a Minister and is in charge of the Building Amendment Bill. I have to say I am deeply deeply sorry about that. This bill is poorly worded. It is a total shambles and it will do nothing to reduce the costs to individuals. 
My first example of the legislative controls concerns a constituent in Greytown a Mr Edridge. He went to the South Wairapapa District Council because he needed resource consent under section 92 or 93 of the Act. He needed resource consent to build a fowl house. It cost him $900 in fees paid to the council for a hen house for five hens. That is absolute nonsense. 
I have another example. I was phoned the other night at 10.15 by a Woodside farmer Roger Barton. Under the modular package in the legislation he had approached the South Wairarapa District Council because he wanted to tender for a sheep shed at Wallaceville and bring it across to the Wairarapa and put it on his farm. He asked what the cost would be and the council said it would be $600 for resource consent. When he actually put the tender in the council then said to him that under the modular arrangement it required him to have an engineering report done before and after moving the shed. The cost of that was $3000. The council did not stop there. Then it said that under the rules that apply in section 94 of the Act he had to take a photograph but it could not be a digital photograph. Mr Barton asked why it could not be a digital photograph and he was told that was because he might adjust it—he might adjust it! 
The point of what I am saying to the Committee is that the Government can have all the rules it likes but under the current legislation and the bill Shane Jones is now responsible for common sense has gone out the window. 
Let me give members another example from Masterton. I have a constituent who has come to New Zealand from Scotland. He has had to go to the local authority to the district council to get approval to put a temporary cover over 17000 strawberries. He has to do that because the territorial authority has to agree as per section 93(2) of the Act to that happening. Now the territorial authority has said that because the temporary cover units to cover the strawberries are coming from the UK—they are sold globally—he cannot bring them into the Wairarapa without an engineer’s report. So that poor man does not know whether to bring them into the country. If he does not bring them into the country he cannot get an engineer’s report. Why is it good enough to bring those units into Australia South Africa the UK and right across Europe yet the legislation here puts red tape in the way of making any sort of progress whatsoever? 
There is another problem with regard to this bill. We can have all the words we like as this bill says and we do not want leaky homes but what about the burst water pipes that may result from importing untested copper pipe from China? I am told by many plumbers in my electorate that that copper pipe will not last 7 years yet it is untested. Why do we have such lengthy legislation I ask Mr Jones when he has done nothing to bring the common-sense testing of materials into it? 
When we look at the whole question of land and subdivision— 
Progress to be reported presently. 
House resumed. 
The Chairperson reported progress on the Building Amendment Bill and no progress on the Human Tissue Bill. 
Report adopted.