Our Strategies

Strategy: Providing clear and robust regulatory regimes for the building and housing sector

What we will do

We will create and foster the development of robust and clearly understood regulatory regimes that will:

• inform people in the sector of what they have to do
• encourage building and housing stakeholders and users to communicate with each other effectively
• provide clearly defined rights and obligations
• ensure, when implemented, that buildings are built correctly
• provide an effective means to resolve disputes.

Why we will do it

Intermediate Outcome

Buildings and homes are built and maintained to standards that reflect consumer, user and community expectations.

The New Zealand regulatory regime sets standards and rules necessary for safe and healthy buildings for the benefit of all users. The Building Act 2004 regulates building work and operates alongside other regulations that set minimum standards across the whole building and housing sector.

Other areas of regulation also impact on the quality of buildings. These include: occupational licensing and regulation of professions and trades, and the regulation of the residential tenancies market and unit titles. This regulation ensures people have the capabilities necessary to build and maintain buildings that are healthy and safe, and that buildings are built and maintained to defined standards of quality.

The building regulatory regime is a performance-based system designed to ensure building work is safe and healthy, offers appropriate amenity and is sustainable. The building controls regime depends on a strong relationship with territorial authorities who are charged with administering building controls. Development of robust and clear standards will ensure the building and housing sector can readily understand and apply them.

This approach will lead to better outcomes for all parties including buildings being built right first time, potentially costly (time and resources) re-work, dispute and litigation situations being avoided, appropriately qualified building practitioners and a functioning rental market.

How we will do it

We will use our technical expertise to ensure the standards we create are robust, clear and fair. We will inform and maintain our technical expertise by remaining up to date with developments in the building and housing sector and by maintaining working connections with the building and housing sector (including consumers, advisory panels, the Interjurisdictional Regulatory Collaboration Committee, Construction Industry Council, Building Research Association of New Zealand, Standards New Zealand, New Zealand Fire Service, Office for Disability Issues) both nationally and internationally.

We will also work with other central and local government agencies to identify issues related to the quality of the existing building stock. This work will identify practical means of improving the quality of existing stock.

What we will deliver

A critical part of this strategy over the next 3 years will be the comprehensive review (as required by the Building Act 2004) of the New Zealand Building Code, the first since it was established in 1992. The objective of the review is to make it better meet users' needs, and to ensure performance standards for buildings are clearer and meet community expectations. The changes will also take into account the Act's expanded purposes and principles including consideration of sustainable development and effects of buildings on health. In 2005/06 we will deliver the framework for the revised Building Code.

Other critical activities include:

• establishment and implementation of regulatory schemes - in 2005/06 we will establish the dam safety, product certification and building consent authority accreditation and registration schemes
• completion of the Residential Tenancies Act review and implementation of its findings
• completion of the Unit Titles Act review, working with the Ministry of Justice and Land Information New Zealand to implement the review's findings
• advice on the regulatory framework to ensure it provides an appropriate balance of rights and responsibilities between parties to building- and housing-related transactions
• advice on an effective framework for the resolution of homeowner building-related disputes
• review of the adequacy of the regulatory framework that applies to existing buildings
• monitoring and reporting on the performance of the building and housing sector, including input into the development of statistics to measure the quality of the existing housing stock
• input into wider government programmes of work to improve the design and quality of the built environment, including the development of urban design protocols and the Auckland Growth Strategy.

Contribution of Output Classes to Strategy
Output Class	Output
Building Act 2004 Implementation	Sector and Regulatory Policy Advice
Building Regulation and Control	Technical Standards Review
Occupational Licensing	Building Practitioner Licensing Scheme
Sector and Regulatory Policy	Sector and Regulatory Policy Advice

Building controls are used to ensure buildings are safe and healthy places to live and work in. In New Zealand, these controls are largely set out in a two-part framework.

• The Building Act 2004 sets out the law on building work - this applies not only to the construction of new buildings but also to the alteration, demolition and maintenance of existing buildings.
• The Building Regulations contain the New Zealand Building Code and the rules about building consents and building inspections. The Building Code sets out performance standards that all building work must meet, and covers aspects such as fire safety, access, moisture control, durability, services and facilities.

The Residential Tenancies Act 1986 (RTA) regulates the rental housing market by defining the rights and obligations of landlords and tenants. Critical to the RTA is a balancing of the social needs of tenants for housing with the business needs of landlords to manage their rental properties effectively.

 

It is 18 years since the RTA came into effect, and the housing environment has changed a lot in that time. In particular, because of the increase in people living in private rental properties, the operation of the private rental sector is now more important to the housing and social outcomes of New Zealanders than it was in 1986.