The project examines the projected impact of the Building (Earthquake-prone Buildings) Amendment Act 2016 (the Act) over the medium and long term. The legislation aims to increase the safety of existing quake prone buildings through regulatory action. Such Imperium power does not exist in a vacuum and this act and its accompanying regulations is no exception. The project aims to assess the act’s likelihood of achieving its purpose by placing it in the wider New Zealand constitutional and economic framework. In doing so it will provide a broad map of where future efforts should be directed to achieve the Act’s goals.
The project will achieve its aim by applying a broad Socio-Legal perspective and identifying areas in which the purposes of the Act are likely to be frustrated by both legal and non-legal obstacles. This imminent critique will provide three concrete outcomes:
An examination of the ability of the Act and its accompanying regulations to achieving its purpose
An examination of the extent to which the Act will ensure the delivery of good engineering practice as laid out in Volume of the Canterbury Earthquakes Royal Commission Report
Provide practical guidance on how the purposes of the act can be delivered in light of the current legislative framework around development, planning and building.