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Source: ONE News -
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Andrew Williams hopes mayors from across New Zealand will come up with a common stance on the leaky home crisis by the end of Friday.
The North Shore mayor says an independent report shows the government could benefit to the tune of $2 billion from the cost of repairs to leaky homes. It says that for every dollar spent on repairing a leaky home, the government will gain 25 cents from GST and other taxes.
The report, commissioned by North Shore City Council at a cost of $17,000, will be tabled at Auckland's monthly mayoral forum on Friday.
Willaims says the research was carried out to put more robust numbers around the "back of the envelope" figures used during negotiations between the six most affected cities and the government over a rescue package for leaky homes victims. He says 70% of NZ's leaky homes will be in the Auckland super city and that represents a massive bill.
Speaking on TVNZ's Breakfast programme, Williams told Paul Henry the council is trying to speed things up to help people living in terrible conditions.
"This is a conservative estimate and does not include the benefit to government of reduced unemployment benefits from this increased building activity, or the savings in public health costs associated with leaky homes victims," Williams says.
He says Building and Construction Minister Maurice Williamson became disengaged after councils rejected the government's offer to pay 10% of costs to repair leaky home. Williams claims since then Williamson has shied away from the whole problem.
"We asked the government to do the sums, they weren't doing it, so we commissioned it," Williams says.
Williams says the idea that the government could profit from the issue would be an insult to long-suffering leaky homes victims, and to ratepayers who are carrying a disproportionate share of the burden. But he is urging the government to look on the crisis as a positive opportunity to stimulate the building economy in New Zealand while "sorting out these people's lives".
Lawyers, courts, contractors and specialists are all having a field day while the debate rages, says Williams, adding that money is going into unnecessary expenditure.
He says if the government contributes 25% along with 25% from local government, and homeowners pick up the rest, "we can get on and start fixing these homes".
Earlier this week the Court of Appeal ruled the North Shore council must pay for repairs to two apartment units, backing the owners of the properties.
"The crystal clear message from the Court of Appeal decision on Monday is that litigation is not the best way forward and that the government needs to get serious about arriving at a rescue package, working with affected councils and the building industry, to finally put this "man-made" national disaster behind us."
Williams says it was the central government in the 1990s that inflicted deregulation of the building industry on home owners and the public, the root cause of the leaky homes disaster.
"Despite escaping legal liability on a legal technicality, their moral and political obligation to these victims is overwhelming.
"A rescue package that is fair to ratepayers and taxpayers that allows leaky home owners to repair their homes and get on with life is the only commonsense way forward."
The research and the report, Contribution to Government Revenue of Leaky Buildings Repairs, was carried out by COVEC, an independent economic, research, forecasting and public policy company.
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