CTV designer rejects court ruling

The designer of the CTV building which collapsed in the 2011 Christchurch earthquake, killing 115 people, says he will forever be haunted by the tragedy but he did not cause it.

Alan Reay was responding to a Court of Appeal decision that disciplinary action can be taken against him by Engineering New Zealand.

Reay was the sole practitioner of his engineering firm which designed the Canterbury Television building in 1986. But he was accused of letting inexperienced engineer David Harding do most of the structural design with minimal supervision.

A three-year inquiry found there were significant flaws in the building’s design. The police considered bringing manslaughter charges against Reay and Harding, but they decided not to prosecute as they would be unlikely to obtain a conviction.

Engineering New Zealand, the industry governing body, began an investigation into Reay but dropped it when he quit the body in 2014.

However, in December the High Court ruled Engineering New Zealand made a mistake in dropping the potential disciplinary proceedings.

Reay lodged an appeal in February but that has been overturned, paving the way for disciplinary proceedings.

In a statement yesterday Reay said he had already accounted for his actions and a further complaint hearing would be “an unjustifiable waste of focus and resource for ENZ and our engineering profession”.

“The collapse of the CTV building could have been avoided, as the evidence to the royal commission showed. I did not cause that, and other engineers who reviewed it during and after it was built did not see the faults in it.

“That tragedy will continue to haunt me for the rest of my life — as I know it will many others.”

He said ENZ’s and the profession’s resources should focus on achieving better building standards and codes.