Page 4571 - Week 11 - Tuesday, 19 October 2010
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this is not always going to be the case, of course. I do think that the idea of complaints, a mediation and adjudication process modelled on the security of payments process, is potentially a good idea to be considered.
I now move to insurance. It is a particular issue for the bigger buildings of four storeys and over because they do not have mandated insurance, and this would seem to be a considerable weakness. All buildings should have mandated insurance. And I note the possibility of a new form of insurance. That would seem a very useful idea. The report has a number of ways this could be achieved.
I do think that, whatever is done, it is very important to look at what I think is the hardest, most intractable problem—that is, the existing significant problems in the current building stock that is less than 10 years old. And I think this is an area which requires considerably more work from this building forum.
In the limited time remaining to me, let me say that the recommendations have been split into short, medium and long-term reforms. There are a good number of reforms which can be done in the short term quite simply—and I am very pleased that some of these have already been done—in the medium term with a bit of work, and in the longer term with more work. It would appear that all of these are likely to improve the building quality in the ACT, although, as I said a minute ago, there is still the big problem of how to help people currently living in substandard buildings.
Most of the recommendations will require funding. I think that this is one of the more interesting issues to deal with, and I certainly think that the building levy idea is worth exploring.
Looking to the future, I am very glad to see that the four working groups are ongoing until the end of the year and that the matter has not ended with this report. And I am pleased to hear that ACTPLA is intending to establish a permanent forum of building certifiers to improve communication regarding emerging issues in the industry. I would hope that the forum would be wider than certifiers and would include the range of people that were involved in the building quality forum so that we make sure that this congruence of problems does not happen in the future.
I note that the initial motion the Assembly passed had a clause foreshadowing an inquiry if the issue was not satisfactorily addressed by November this year. I would like to suggest that what we should do is extend this option to next year, given that the work on the issue has not concluded. So it would be pre-emptive for the Assembly to decide whether or not the issues have been satisfactorily addressed.
I would also like to request that the planning minister report back to the Assembly in August 2011 on the progress of the review and of the implementation of the short-term recommendations. The Assembly would be in a better position then to assess whether a further inquiry was necessary at this point. Perhaps we could also have a progress report when the working groups have finished. At the end of the round of meetings this year it would be quite helpful if the planning minister could report back on these.
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