Heatley Phil: Building Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Heatley Phil: Building Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:645;Page:14725] 
PHIL HEATLEY (National—Whangarei) 
: 
 I would like to bring some clarity to the issue of where the costs fall when we are talking about the building levies which have skyrocketed in recent years. They have skyrocketed to support the bureaucracy that has to underpin bills like this Building Amendment Bill that are passed in this Parliament. I would like to read to the House comments from the transcript of the Finance and Expenditure Committee meeting that dealt with the annual financial review of the Department of Building and Housing. This is from the chief executive: “The Building Act activities are funded from the building levies. They are not Crown-funded.” Heatley: “That’s right. So the levy payer essentially pays; it’s not the taxpayer?”. Chief executive: “That’s correct.” Heatley: “How are the levies collected again roughly?”. Chief executive: “They are collected by the territorial authorities and they are part of the consenting costs.” 
So the levies are part of the consenting process. And who pays for the consent? The consent is ultimately paid by the first-home buyer or in this case the first-home person who is contracting the building work the building of his or her first home. This is just another bill for those people. So when we talk in Part 2 about the validation in respect of levies on the estimated value of building work we are talking about the first-home builder if you like paying and it is just another cost on top of all the other costs to do with consenting particularly the Resource Management Act consent costs that ultimately the first-home buyer has to foot the bill for. 
At that select committee meeting we were astonished to discover the wastage of the building levies that are to be validated here in Part 2. I will give the committee an example of that. It appears that the Department of Building and Housing employed Unisys to develop a computer system that was to record the registration or licensing of builders across this country. Unisys was supposed to develop for $1.2 million a system that would record the name date of birth and contact details of licensed builders as well as the registration number the name of the company the status and history of the person’s licence and whether the licence had ever been suspended. Unisys ended up having to set aside all that work—and I will tell members soon how much that work was worth—but the levy payer had paid for all of it. That work is now in the dustbin; Unisys was paid to go away. How much was it paid? It was paid $653000—$653000 of building levy costs were thrown at Unisys and Unisys in turn put its work in the dustbin. 
But that is not all. Let us wait; there is more! We discovered at that select committee that not only was that work put in the dustbin and $653000 thrown at Unisys to make it go away but apparently there were more consultants’ costs advisers’ costs and project management costs that went along with that discarded project. Believe it or not we heard from the XACTA Group which supplied contract staff to assist with documentation and was paid $193000. Its work is now in the dustbin. AMR Consulting supplied project management and contract staff to assist with the creation of that computer system and it was paid $127000 of levy payers’ money. Kensington Swan supplied legal services on options to end the contract with Unisys. So Kensington Swan came in to help to end the contract with Unisys and was paid $54000 of levy payers’ money. All that added up believe it or not to another $646000. 
So on one side Unisys chucked its work on a computer system for the registration of builders in the bin and was paid $653000 to make it go away and on the other side all the consultants who supplied support work and legal services and the suppliers of contract staff and project management were collectively paid $646000 for the work that eventually ended up in the dustbin. 
John Carter 
: And where did that money come from? 
PHIL HEATLEY 
: Wait a minute—but wait; wait a minute. If we add up both totals we get a grand sum of over $1.2 million of levy payers’ funds that was chucked in the rubbish tin— 
John Carter 
: Gone in this bin. 
PHIL HEATLEY 
: It has gone in there. There were $1.2 million of levy payers’ funds put in the bin. 
We have described where those levy payers’ funds come from. Essentially they come through the consenting process and the first-home buyer pays them. First-home buyers in this country have paid $1.2 million for a computer system to register builders—to license builders—but none of it will be used. The Department of Building and Housing which started with a clean sheet will go through the process all over again. Yet the Labour Government and the Minister in the chair the Hon Darren Hughes are asking this House of Representatives 121 MPs to support them in this type of wastage—to support them in billing first-home buyers for $1.2 million that is going nowhere that is being thrown away—and to support them in more regulation and legislation that actually snows those builders and first-home buyers with more documentation more regulatory hoops more plans they have to submit to councils more forms they have to fill in and more consultants they have to engage. And on it goes. 
Why should this House of Representatives support a Labour Government that has introduced a Building Act that has been amended now—how many times? How many times did my colleague the Hon Dr Nick Smith say? How many times has this legislation been amended now? 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: It’s No. 4. 
PHIL HEATLEY 
: No. 4! The Government has introduced legislation to this House that has needed to be amended four times. Why should this House of Representatives support that particularly when members see the wastage and when we see builders rocking up to our offices right across the country to complain about the amount of regulation and red tape they have to deal with? And councils themselves are complaining now. In fact we had the mayor of the Far North District Council go to see the building Minister. We had the mayor of Whangarei District Council go to the building Minister and the mayors said themselves that councils have just had enough. 
Interestingly councils cannot even employ enough planners or building inspectors to work through the piles of paper that they need to. They cannot do that and they are saying that their bureaucracies are growing and they have had enough. Yet this Labour Government has the nerve to come to us cap in hand for the fourth time to fix up its Building Act when we have lining up behind us builders first-home buyers councils and even mayors who tell us not to do this. They say they have had enough—that they want there to be no more paper from Wellington. The councils say they want to streamline themselves and cut the red tape because they no longer want to pass on the costs to first-home buyers. They see the problem and ask us to please not support this legislation. Is it any wonder that mayors and councils up and down the country are looking to the National Party for solutions and are hearing the right answers? 
I am concerned that the Minister in the chair has not stood to address any of the problems that we have put to him today or last night for that matter in the debating chamber. Do Government members not care about prospective first home buyers being locked out of buying their first home? Do they not care that homeownership rates are the lowest they have been in this country for 50 years? Do they not care that mortgage interest rates are now going through the roof? Of course rents are rising as well. We will not support this legislation. Why should we? It is the fourth time. 
Debate interrupted.