Government should pay for strengthening of buildings - Bob Jones

Financial assistance from the government is needed for strengthening of earthquake-prone buildings, says property investor Bob Jones 

Speaking on The Nation, Sir Robert said regular changes to the standards over the years came at a huge cost to property owners and some simply can’t afford it anymore.

“Now morally if they change their minds they should pay for it, that happens every six to eight years and now they're going to do that again but they don’t pay for it, they don’t offer interest free loans, they don’t even allow us to deduct that cost they say no that’s not an expense, most people can’t afford it and they keep lifting it and that’s why we have a problem because its simply not economic they don’t have the money,” he said.

Changes to the Building Act are expected to be announced in the coming weeks and this may mean earthquake-prone heritage buildings like Wellington’s Public Trust building will have a tighter deadline to strengthen.

Historic Places Trust chief executive Bruce Chapman said if people want to maintain historic buildings, then both local and central Government will need to help. He cites examples of some Councils across the country already doing this.

“There are a number of councils around the Council using those methods at the moment, Auckland council has transferable development rights, another bunch of councils are using consent fee waivers, some are using very permissible zoning provisions, others are using low interest loans, Dunedin city is using that, some councils have chosen to purchase buildings, upgrade them and then on-sell them so there area techniques that are being used but it is a very significant issue for owners,” said Mr Chapman.

Wellington City Council Earthquake Resilience manager Neville Brown said rate payers can’t always foot the bill for building strengthening but understands the sentimental value that some buildings have to people.

“I guess our view that we've arrived at is that it can’t always be the rate payer because they don’t always have an interest in the commercial areas of the city but that said our community says that heritage is important and we have a couple of mechanisms in place to help building owners and we are researching a couple more that we might be able to put in place,” said Mr Brown.

He also said if the amended Building Act declares a new national standard for strengthening, then the application of it should be tailored to each region.

“We think its fine to have a national standard, but the way its implemented will need to be strictly tailored to the level of risk and also the affordability and do-ability of that work in other centres because we all need seismic engineers and they’re a scarcity right now,” said Mr Brown.