Building reforms eliminate council permits for garages and other low-risk home projects

BRUCE MOUNSTER, Mercury January 8, 2017 2:11pm

HOMEOWNERS wanting to build a garage, shed or porch now just have to go to the hardware store, get the materials and start work. State Government building reforms which eliminate council building approval requirements for “low-risk work” have come into effect.

Building and Construction Minister Guy Barnett said the nation-leading reforms had removed all red tape for simple projects such as:

• CONSTRUCTION of a shed, garage or carport up to 18 square metres.
• ERECTION of a prefabricated shed, garage or carport up to 36 square metres.
• BUILDING A PORCH up to 9 square metres, or a deck of any size up to 1m off the ground.

“A homeowner or a competent person working for the owner may carry out this work without the need for the homeowner to be registered as an owner builder, engage a building surveyor, apply for a building permit or fill in application forms or pay approval fees,” he said.

Homeowners who hire a licenced builder can commission a wider range of low-risk work without approval, including:

• INTERIOR alterations to an existing residential building.
• REMOVAL OR INSTALLATION of load bearing walls.
• BUILDING A SHED or garage up to 36 square metres or a porch up to 18 square metres.
  

More complex work, referred to as medium-risk, can also be carried out by a licenced builder if the plans are assessed and certified by a licenced building surveyor.

Mr Barnett said previously it would often take longer to fill out the forms and wait for the approvals than it did to actually complete the building project.

“More home building and renovation projects will provide a huge boost for Tasmanian retailers and help support jobs,” he said.

“But it’s not just DIY Tasmanians that will benefit. Licensed builders and plumbers will no longer need council building permits for a range of works, up to and including two-storey homes.

“Tasmanians, especially those working in the building and construction industry, which employs close to 20,000 locals, will benefit through less red tape and more common sense rules.”

END

EDITOR’S NOTE: There are upsides and downsides to this development and it would appear that the whole scenario has not been thought through all that well. Immediately coming to mind are the liability issues. Just who is it that carries the liability load and how can their risks be mitigated and by whom?

Importantly this move removes an administrative load from council operations and hopefully it is the thin edge of the wedge that removes the entire quality assurance relative to ‘building and construction’ from Local Govt. altogether. As it has turned out this ‘service’ has become expensive and increasingly burdensome for ratepayers in a general way and developers in particular. This is not to say that building and construction doesn’t need regulating it just doesn’t need to be ‘the council’ that does it.

The dead hand of building surveyors interpretation of ‘the regulations’ can have, and arguably has had a blanding impact the built environment in urban areas. When this happens against the specter of ‘lowest common denominator’ decision making the opportunities to embrace new technologies and/or new understandings of past conventions shrink exponentially.

When this happens in combination with the ‘managerialism’ that is increasingly determining outcomes via the administration of Local Govt. operations there are increased opportunities to invoke self-serving deeming not always based on evidence or appropriate domain knowledge. Typically ‘quality’ is the victim!

Many council have withdrawn from the provision on building and construction surveying and arguably this will be a saving for ratepayers generally. Interestingly the City of Launceston maintains the  ‘service’ and arguably as a ratepayer subsidised service. This also, arguably, has the effect of maintaining the size of the city’s bureaucracy – Tasmania’s largest local govt. bureaucracy(?).

At face value, it is arguable that it is a service that is as a consequence a ‘ratepayer subsidised service’ operating in competition – unfair competition(?) – with independent service providers. Why might this be so? Who benefits and at what cost to whom?

There is clearly a need to give the building and construction component of ‘local administration’ a good shake. If the qualified relaxation of regulations for so-called minor works is in fact a step towards removing building and construction supervision from ‘council administration’, and thus tempering the salaries-with-benefits-churn, this holds the promise of it being a significant step forward.

Moreover, if the service providers employed by councils are indeed ‘effective experts’, and are able to compete in the competitive market they could and should be doing so on a true cost recovery basis.