Tremain Chris: Plumbers Gasfitters and Drainlayers Bill — In Committee 
Tremain Chris: Plumbers Gasfitters and Drainlayers Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:635;Page:6677] 
CHRIS TREMAIN (National—Napier) 
: 
 I rise to speak to Part 6 of the Plumbers Gasfitters and Drainlayers Bill. Before doing so I acknowledge the officials for the hard work they put into this bill which has been ongoing and arduous. I say well done to them; they have done an excellent job. 
Part 6 gets to the heart of the bill and deals with the registration and licensing of plumbers gasfitters and drainlayers. When this part was originally considered by the Commerce Committee as part of the Energy Safety Review Bill we got comments from plumbers in the field who had not been consulted by their board or did not really understand how this licensing or continuing professional development would impact on them. That is when we had the likes of George M Todd saying in a submission that he strongly opposed ongoing professional development. 
When that happened I realised I needed to understand where this licensing was going what it would entail and what ongoing competency would be required of plumbers. So I went and had a talk to the Plumbers Gasfitters and Drainlayers Board. I found out that licensing is still required right now and that it costs $90 per year. There is already a licensing regime with the existing registration certificate. Of the three trades we are talking about—plumbing gasfitting and drainlaying—there is already an ongoing competency requirement for gasfitters which at the time I was not aware of. Gasfitters are audited on an annual basis unlike plumbers who are audited on a job-by-job basis on the major plumbing jobs they do in houses. Gasfitters are not audited this way; they are audited annually by the board so they already have a continuing professional development requirement. But what does that actually mean? 
Plumbers were coming to the select committee concerned that the requirement would take hours and days of their time and would cause ongoing costs for them by taking their employees out of the trade to go on courses. I found out that the board was proposing a 16 credit per annum continuing professional development qualification. Those 16 credits were divided into two lots of eight credits whereby people could choose between technical courses for eight credits and non-technical courses. 
The technical courses included welding and pipe sizing—the standard types of courses that one would think it would be good for a plumber to go forward with. It was the non-technical courses that the plumbers were—justifiably—concerned about. These included the likes of becoming a Microsoft Word user for which people could get four continuing professional development points. They could get points for gaining email and Internet qualifications. These options were on the table and this is where many of the plumbers became concerned. They thought these courses would become compulsory. 
The reality is that the non-technical side of the course is non-compulsory which made a big difference. Many plumbers particularly those who were heading towards the end of their working life were concerned. E G Wall whom I talked about before and who has been plumbing for 40 years came to see me in my electorate office and said: “Why in God’s name do I need to be doing a foundation Excel course in spreadsheeting?”. I could not argue with him. The very fact that these non-technical courses are not compulsory made a big difference. 
Moving on I approached a number of gasfitters who are already involved in continuing professional development courses. A young gasfitter called Carl Simons said that there should be ongoing competency. He felt it was a good thing but that it needed much better consultation and course provision. I say to the Minister that we need to make very clear to the Plumbers Gasfitters and Drainlayers Board that the provision of these types of licensing courses should be available throughout the regions so that plumbers and gasfitters do not have to travel around the country to attend a particular course. I think that is a very important point. Young Carl Simons believed that the ongoing licensing requirement added another level to his trade and said he was right behind it. 
I talked to Murray Rigby who is a 52-year-old gasfitter in the Hawke’s Bay. He did not think it was a bad thing. He thought the courses were pretty straightforward. He felt there was a lot of resistance initially but that overall it was good for the profession and would take him forward. So I recommend to the Minister that these courses be made available on a regional basis and that there be plenty of them so that plumbers gasfitters and drainlayers can get to them easily. 
Licensing has been a key issue in this legislation. It is an area we were concerned about. Lastly National members Labour members and the wider committee were concerned about the older plumbers. In the commentary to the bill the committee put in something that I think officials and the board need to take note of. We stated: “We were concerned by the introduction of licensing requirements for tradespeople in the later years of their profession who after thirty or forty years of plying their trade will be required to pass competency tests.” We were concerned that if those tests were too onerous guys in their twilight years would just say: “Enough! I can’t be bothered going on.” and we would see those people leave the trade. We did see that happen initially when continuing professional development was introduced to the gasfitting side of things. That is something we need to be careful of and that is why members from National certainly and I know ones from Labour put that particular part in the commentary on the bill. Thank you Mr Chairperson. 
The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 78 in the name of the Hon Harry Duynhoven to Part 6 be agreed to. 
Amendments agreed to. 
Part 6 as amended agreed to.