ACT: back professional self-certification to build faster and cheaper

Responding to National’s proposal to let qualified engineers sign off certain work without council inspection and establish a specialist Building Consent Authority, ACT Building and Construction spokesperson Cameron Luxton says:

"National is right to trust qualified professionals and want to reduce council duplication. ACT would go further.

"Builders should be able to opt out of the council consenting system where work is self-certified by qualified professionals and backed by long-term private insurance.

"That would put responsibility with the people designing and building the work, rather than councils and ratepayers who had little control over it.

"A specialist Building Consent Authority would give major projects another option, but ACT would extend that choice much further.

“National has accepted the principle that councils do not need to inspect and approve every part of every building. With more ACT MPs, New Zealand can finish the job by making professional self-certification a genuine alternative to the council consenting monopoly."