You may recall that late in May 2020 the Government announced some sweeping changes to the building consent regime that were intended to increase the volume of low-risk building work and lessen Councils’ workloads. This was promoted as one of the ways to kick-start the economy in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. The idea was that if you remove the expense and delay associated with applying for a building consent for low-risk projects, then a lot more people will undertake that work, builders will be busier than they would have been, and more money will start flowing through the economy. Savings of up to $18 million in consenting costs, and a reduction in Council workload of up to 9,000 consents per year were projected.
that the building consent restrictions can be gradually eased from time to time.
Are these changes a big deal? Whether these exemptions do result in an increase in building activity remains to be seen. At the time I wrote this, they were due to come into force in two stages – some of them at the end of August 2020, and the rest – those that rely on the involvement of licensed building practitioners – later in the year when other changes are made to the Building Act. I suspect those launch dates will prove to be a little optimistic, particularly the latter one. Furthermore, most of the exemptions aren’t new, but are simply old exemptions that have been relaxed a little more. For example, you could always build small-scale single-storey detached buildings, carports, awnings, porches and verandas, and bridges without a consent, it’s just that the permitted dimensions have been increased. And most of those structures will only avoid the consent regime if a Chartered Professional Engineer has carried out or reviewed the design (at considerable
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You could be forgiven for thinking this was some kind of hallelujah moment, as though building activity was being freed up for the first time in history. In fact, that’s not the case and it is simply the latest relaxation of the building consent rules in a series of reforms that have been happening over the past 20 years – the previous ones having occurred in 2004, 2008, 2010, 2013 and 2019. With the steady improvements in building product quality, the proliferation of prefabrication and modular construction, and the increases in the qualifications and expertise required of builders, it is inevitable
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Will the new building consent exemptions save the building industry?
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