‘A dog, a ute and a bloody radio’
You too can be a builder in post-earthquake Canterbury. All you need is a dog, a ute and a radio. That is the crude view of Canterbury Master Builders president Ivan Stanicich.
A lack of knowledge, he said, was one reason why defective earthquake repairs are one of the biggest blights on the Canterbury building industry.
In 2015, Greater Christchurch Regeneration Minister Gerry Brownlee vowed construction ‘‘cowboys’’ who did shoddy repairs for the Earthquake Commission (EQC) would pay for their mistakes.
But Stanicich is sceptical: ‘‘They say ‘it’s the industry’s fault’, well, no it’s not. They had a vetting process that was very poor.
‘‘Anybody basically with a dog, a ute and a bloody radio could start up as a builder,’’ he said.
Last year, the Government investigated unconsented earthquake repairs. A third were not compliant with the Building Code.
Foundation specialist Bevan Craig said the survey, based on a pool of properties pre-selected by EQC and insurers, was ‘‘the very diluted tip of a very big iceberg’’.
The amount recorded as being spent on re-revisiting initial repairs is $7 million and climbing. The final cost could be in the region of $60m-$70m. But thousands of defective repair jobs are out of view.
As of September 16, the Government-owned natural disaster insurer had started, or was planning to start, 481 underfloor remedial jobs. Builder and underfloor specialist Gideon Couper said he had seen post-quake repair work that ‘‘would boggle your mind’’. ‘‘I can politely say that I see a large amount of poor quality housing that’s on the ground, full of borer, rotten, with poor quality concrete.’’
MBIE did not consider inadequate scoping in Canterbury was the result of the department’s guidance. ‘‘The MBIE Canterbury guidance clearly states that by following it, repairs or rebuild designs will meet the Building Code. The guidance is not designed to address insurance entitlements.’’
Homeowners Lynley Sutherland and Tony Waddell thought their post-quake nightmare was over when they purchased a new home last week, after spending five years dealing with EQC and insurer Southern Response over their previous property.
They were wrong. When they moved in they found expansion joins had opened, floor cracks had been filled with anchor fix, and some not at all. The previous owners, she believed, had sold the property in ‘‘good faith’’ and were unaware of the cracks around the house.
Sutherland told EQC contractors completing renovations at her newly purchased home were willing to fix the defects following an inspection. ‘‘All we wanted was an inspection so they would agree to cash settle this. But EQC won’t.’’ After inquiries from the Sunday
Star-Times, EQC changed its tune and visited the property on Friday. ‘‘EQC will assess this claim, together with what damage that may have been caused by previous earthquake events,’’ a spokesman said. If there were issues with the repairs, or the damage was new and earthquakerelated, the couple would be offered a cash settlement.
After petitioning for an inquiry into defective repairs, insurance lawyer Dr Duncan Webb has been asked to present to a Parliamentary committee on November 16.
Because post-earthquake repairs were insurer or EQC-led, Webb says, builders have few incentives to do quality work.
‘‘If you own your own home and you think ‘I want to, you know, do some renovations’ . . . the builder’s going to have you breathing down his neck. If he doesn’t get it right you’ll be asking him what’s gone on.
‘‘For the insurer-led repairs, of course . . . their only real concern is to get this job done for the most cost-effective price.
‘‘Some of them cut corners.’’