Fired house inspectors in mood to sue

By ANNE GIBSON

The owner of a deregistered building certification firm says he will sue the Government agency that felled his business.

Approved Building Certifiers director Neil Boler said his $3 million business was worthless after this week's deregistration by the Building Industry Authority, and he would sue the authority for his losses.

The future of about $1 billion-worth of Auckland homes was also in doubt, he said, and he was concerned about the homeowners.

"We've been shafted by the Government and the claims against us are a complete fabrication," Mr Boler said from Australia yesterday.

"The authority has acted as judge, jury and executioner, and as far as I'm concerned it's a kangaroo court."

He predicted that his firm's deregistration was the first step in the demise of the private certification industry, which would cease to exist by next March.

The authority found Approved had been "negligent and incompetent in its operations as a building certifier", had breached the Building Act, had careless record-keeping and made faulty inspections.

The authority acted on complaints by North Shore and Waitakere City Councils, shutting Approved's offices at Mt Wellington, Albany and Whangarei.

Mr Boler shut his unprofitable Henderson operation this year.

Approved was one of Auckland's largest private building certifiers, and had about 5000 properties on its books.


Mr Boler said the deregistration was an attempt to shift the blame for the leaky buildings crisis on to the certification industry.

"They're just covering their butts to protect themselves. It's the authority that's trying to turn the blame back on to the certifiers."

But he acknowledged that his firm had problems, particularly fallout from the leaky buildings crisis.

Approved certified many multi-unit housing complexes with leaks, including Sacramento in Botany Downs and Greenwich Park, between Symonds St and the motorway.

Greenwich Park owners this year abandoned a $9 million court action in favour of secret payments to help repair their units, and Mr Boler said yesterday his firm had contributed to those payments.

But he disputed that Approved's work was negligent.

Authority chief executive John Ryan said yesterday that Approved had been deregistered to protect consumers against negligent practices.

He was sorry some home building and renovation jobs would be disrupted, but said the authority would try to smooth the process.

What was Approved Building Certifiers?

* The firm specialised in inspecting new houses, additions and alterations.

* It acted as the final backstop between a home owner and a city council.

* It issued code compliance certificates so that building work could be approved as legal.

* It inspected properties under construction to ensure the Building Act was being obeyed.

* Many of the multi-unit housing complexes it inspected are leaking and Approved has been forced to make big payments to homeowners.