Broken homes

Residents of Mulberry Place tell Sophie Bond about the heartache of life in a slip zone and the latest decision that has them fuming.
Kathy Torkington and Nikola Andrejevic talk in the home office of Kathy's Glenfield house, their faces showing a mix of anger, frustration and fatigue. On Kathy's knees is a thick pile of letters, copies of emails, LIM reports, building plans and a resource consent application.
Ms Torkington and Mr Andrejevic live in two of the three houses at 1 Mulberry Place. In June 2008, a landslip after heavy rain destroyed their driveway, damaged a corner of Mr Andrejevic's house and left the two dwellings on the property below, at 1A Mulberry Place, uninhabitable.
The three homes had a combined value of $915,000. Now they are worth less than $50,000 each.
Ms Torkington says it has been a maddening two years.
"We've no way out.
"We can't rent them out and we can't get insurance. Our houses are worth nothing. Unless the council buys our houses, nobody is going to buy our houses."
Nikola Andrejevic says: "I am a prisoner. I've lost my life completely."
Ms Torkington moved to Mulberry Place in 2002 and became aware of land movement in 2006. "The council kept telling us it was under control," she says.
She says the area has a history of slips and the hillside is still unstable.
She says the decision by a former council to allow development leaves North Shore City Council liable. She points to a 1982 letter to Takapuna City Council from its solicitors about the unstable land, which says, "Legally speaking, the council is at risk because either it, or its predecessor allowed or at least condoned subdivisional works that resulted in major alterations to the ground profiles."
This year, North Shore City Council bought the land at 1A Mulberry Place and, this month, lodged a resource consent application to stabilise it. The council's manager of issues resolution, Paul O'Brien, says he is unable to comment on the details of this purchase as it is a "confidential settlement" with the previous owners.
Ms Torkington wants to know why the council settled with the owners of 1A if, as it has always maintained, it is not liable for the slip.
The council calls the stabilisation work a global fix [as much as it is prepared to do] and offers to include drainage improvements at 1 Mulberry Place as part of it.
The residents refused, as the offer stipulates this would be a "full and final settlement of all disputes".
Ms Torkington says the council should spend the money on buying their houses instead.
"Nobody will say the global fix will work. From the start, the council has just wanted to cover this up. It has such 100 per cent control it can disregard everything we say."
The residents say they won't stop fighting for compensation and they hope the new council will help.
Slip of the tongue?
Ms Torkington has had to buy her property file "multiple times" to see how it has been updated and says emails and reports found in it support her belief the council is liable for the slip damage.
From an internal North Shore City Council email regarding removal of a tree in the slip zone: "Council is very likely to be sued for causing the landslip in the first place. We don't want to compound our probably legal culpability by failing to action this one."