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Leonie Freeman: Property Institute CEO weighs in on new earthquake-based building rules · Best of Business

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  Speaker 1: You're listening to a podcast from News Talks be follow
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  Speaker 2: Staying on property, Property owners and engineering experts are welcoming
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  Speaker 2: the shakeup of the earthquake building rules that we're announced
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  Speaker 2: by Chris Pink today. Government is limiting the kind of
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  Speaker 2: buildings that these rules will be applied to. We concrete
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  Speaker 2: buildings three stories or higher, all buildings constructed with unreinforced masonry.
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  Speaker 2: Leone Freeman is the chief executive of the Property Institute
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  Speaker 2: and with us high Leoni.
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  Speaker 3: Hi, good afternoon. You welcoming them too, Yes, very much.
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  Speaker 3: So we see it as a common sense approach that
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  Speaker 3: still continues to preserve life safety, which is the key objective.
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  Speaker 3: But it doesn't leave our communities as ghost towns, which
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  Speaker 3: is what's been happening with so many derelict buildings and
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  Speaker 3: small towns in our biggest cities.
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  Speaker 2: How quickly, realistically will some of those buildings open up again,
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  Speaker 2: like reading Cinema in Wellington, order the Amora Hotel.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's I mean this legislation, this announcement today is
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  Speaker 3: just the first step that so it will go through
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  Speaker 3: and the legislation will be developed, and I understand that
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  Speaker 3: the bill will be passed before the next year's election,
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  Speaker 3: so it's still a bit of time to go. But
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  Speaker 3: what it has done is, you know, it's signaling to
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  Speaker 3: the industry what is going to happen, and so I
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  Speaker 3: think that is a positive thing. When it comes to
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  Speaker 3: specific buildings, you know, we still have to see what
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  Speaker 3: the details going to to that sits under it, because
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  Speaker 3: they're talking about creating a new assessment tool and we
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  Speaker 3: want to understand so the you know, for something like
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  Speaker 3: the reading cinema cinema, we'd have to wait and see
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  Speaker 3: the detail. How many stories is that the reading sympt cinema.
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  Speaker 3: I'm not not sure. I'm not a Wellingtonian, but I
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  Speaker 3: think very highly. I don't think so. It might be
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  Speaker 3: two or three years.
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  Speaker 2: So then basically it's it's all go, isn't it.
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  Speaker 1: No?
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  Speaker 3: You know, they've still got to do the assessment because
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  Speaker 3: what they're trying to do with this is they want
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  Speaker 3: to focus on the high risk buildings. And I can't
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  Speaker 3: comment on the reading cinema to see whether it's high
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  Speaker 3: risk or not, so I'm not making any comment on that.
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  Speaker 3: But what it is doing is saying instead of having
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  Speaker 3: a blanket rule which sort of covers everybody and everything.
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  Speaker 3: They're saying, we're going to be a lot more nuanced,
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  Speaker 3: and it's going to be you know, whether an urban
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  Speaker 3: center or a smaller town, whether it's three stories plus,
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  Speaker 3: which probably the reading cinema is, and if you've got
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  Speaker 3: an unreinforced masonry building. So it's focused on really trying
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  Speaker 3: to solve the problems that create risk for people in
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  Speaker 3: buildings rather than a blanket approach.
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  Speaker 2: What do you think the impact on insurance will be?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a good question. Again, the more certainty we
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  Speaker 3: can provide in the space, the better for everyone involved,
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  Speaker 3: because because the rules have kept changing and people, you know,
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  Speaker 3: you can have different engineers go to a building and
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  Speaker 3: somebody says, oh, it's fifty percent of the in NBS
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  Speaker 3: or new building standard, and someone else says it's seventy percent,
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  Speaker 3: And then an owner might upgrade a building, but then
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  Speaker 3: in a few years after it they have to upgrade again.
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  Speaker 3: It's just created a whole lot of uncertainty and people
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  Speaker 3: have just stopped and said, well, we you know, and
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  Speaker 3: we've seen a lot more buildings become derelict, empty and
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  Speaker 3: not being updated. So I think once we get through this,
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  Speaker 3: then you know. The insurance premiums. I think you know
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  Speaker 3: because they are targeted at what they perceive as risk,
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  Speaker 3: and to me, this is part of that whole risk assessment. Leoni.
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  Speaker 2: By the way, have you caught up on this business
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  Speaker 2: with the Dixon Street flats in Wellington?
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  Speaker 3: No, I can't say I have.
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  Speaker 2: I'll go and read about it'll fascinate you. Thank you
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  Speaker 2: for your time. I really appreciated. Leoni Freeman, Chief Executive
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  Speaker 2: Property Institute.
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