HI Jeremy
Introducing myself, Registered Building Surveyor with construction industry experience of 15 years
over residential and commercial throughout the state.
I have read the draft review and have the following comment.
With the introduction of the new Building Act it has open up the market for more bad workmanship
in every sector. I have had some serious cases of bad plumbing work undertake in the residential
industry in Geraldton area. Most dealings with the plumber were reasonable because it was more of
an education thing. Using the Jim Bowbridge Plumbing inspector for consulting for technical items
the situation usually resulted a compliant plumbing work. The problems is that the Building surveyor
of the local authority has no powers to enforce the plumber standards through the NCC or Building
Act. The draft review address this which is good, monitoring is the key to ensure building standard
are applied. (85% of building inspections fail) If the Building surveyor had the right and authority to
inspect for monitoring and then if need in consultation with technical plumbing officer, then is
would result in a huge benefit to customer satisfaction and risk management for Plumbing board. In
my experiences I would take photos and measurements and forward my technical question to Jim
and he would advise me the correct applicable building standard and then I would enforce the
solution to the plumber stating that the Plumbing board have be notified and need it rectified before
submitting compliances certificate. This system worked well but there is only one Jim Bowbridge.
Most Building surveyor have the industry experience to see if something does not look right and are
professional in performance base solutions/standards as we are the once sign the certificate of
design compliances.
Enforcement, all local authority have all the permit that are issued with regard to building work,
there are staff at each local government processing the documents, why isn’t the plumbers
details/certificates and report part of the process on notice of completion or a statutory
requirement? This would allow the monitoring process to be easily enforced. (e.g. man power of
local government) Beyond the meter again it is on crown land or reserve which these areas are
under the local authority. One easy solution is to included the NNC volume three in the Building
Regulations 2011 r3 terms used Building Standards which would allow for enforcement by the local
permit authority.
I believe there is still a place for the plumbing state register which would be controlled by the WA
Building Commission and included Technical officers.
I will be watching this space. Good luck.
A Building Surveyor