David Clifton: Institute of Building Surveyors President on the Government's proposed building consents scheme

Not everyone in the industry is on board with the Government’s proposed building consents scheme. 

Businesses with a track record of delivering bigger projects, will be able to access streamlined consenting. 

Qualified tradespeople will be able to forego inspections for low risk builds through the opt in 'self-certification scheme'. 

Institute of Building Surveyors President David Clifton told Mike Hosking consents are there for a reason, as not all builders are perfect and there's still a high failure rate with consents. 

Clifton told Hosking we need to get our foundation right before moving forward on this. 

He says if we get our education, building and consenting processes right, then this can happen. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Not everyone's thrilled. So what are the risks here of
the New Zealand Institute of Building Serve as President Dave
clifton'she us David morning.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
Good boy, Mike having it on.

Speaker 1 (00:10):
In nowheries at all? Are you up against it in
the sense that everyone's just going to go, thank God
for the some sick of paperwork, let's get on with it,
and you're going to you've got a feeling tough old
road a ho here in terms of red flags.

Speaker 2 (00:22):
I think it's a case of we've got the devil's
in the detail and the oversimplification that's come out might
be the issue. I mean, we've got to look at
the key issues here is that you know this talk
of the consent being very expensive and time consuming, and
they can be, but they also provide the consumer protection
that we need in the industry and in the construction sector.

(00:44):
And they provide the trust levels that consumers need that
things have been done properly. And I think when you
look at there are lots of really really good builders
out there and there some that aren't so good. And
I think we still have an issue of a high
failure rate of inspections within the industry, and we do
need to make sure that our education processes for builders

(01:07):
and consultants is up to scratch and that our sort
of continued professional development is there as well. I think
those are really important factors that need need to be
worked on first before we start doing self certification. I
think it's something that we can work towards, but I
think it's something that we've got to work towards, not
just start doing. I think also as mention of the

(01:30):
professional indemnity insurance, as far as we're aware, that's not
really a professional indemnity insurance market for this in New Zealand, well,
it will be creative potentially, but it's at the moment
it's it's not there, and it takes a lot to
trade a new market in this of space. Professional indemnity
insurance like we hold as redative building surveyors is as

(01:52):
a high threshold, high cost element and backed by international
markets and the like. A large scale design and build
contracts have them, and they're they're expensive policies.

Speaker 1 (02:05):
A sparky they self sertify.

Speaker 2 (02:08):
Yeah, I think, but when you look at the failure
rates that we see from those in that in that
sector specifically, Sparky in my life. No, but the failure
rates for those those people is incredibly low. So Sparky's
failure rates on inspections and those things, it's very very low,
whereas in general construction and we still have very high

(02:31):
rates of failure of inspections. And that is the key
for fundamental here. We have to make sure that we're
getting it right first before we can go off and
do it by ours Would you.

Speaker 1 (02:39):
Be convinced once we actually see the legislation what's going
to get passed by way of law, could you be
convinced that they're onto it, they know what they're doing,
and we could actually be improving things or not.

Speaker 2 (02:49):
Oh yeah, I think. Look, it's all defining the detail here,
and it's all about just getting our baselines and our
foundations right, education, getting our inspection processes right, getting our
build processes right. If those things are created in the
right space, in the right way, and built on then
these things can happen. And you know, they'll still need
to be random inspections and audits and checks to make

(03:11):
sure that everybody is still playing by the same rules
and there aren't Cordner's cut and we don't end up
where we were twenty years ago exactly.

Speaker 1 (03:17):
David, appreciate it very much. David Clifton, New Zealand Institute
of Building Survey as fourteen minutes past seven. Just quickly,
while I'm on housing, the rental prices for the month
route we've hit an eight month low median price around
the country six thirty. It's down ten bucks are one
point six percent. Biggest decreases Marlborough down thirty bucks, Canterbury
down twenty five, Hawk's Bay down to six hundred, ten

(03:39):
Bucks down to six hundred and forty. Places that have
gone up Northland, Nelson, Tasman, Southland. But mind you and
south And you're still only paying an average of four
hundred and seventy five dollars a week, so it's not
the end of the world. For more from the Mic
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