Building permit levy to pay for half of Victoria's $600 million combustible cladding rectification

Building permit levy to pay for half of Victoria's $600 million combustible cladding rectification
Staff reporterDecember 7, 2020

Victoria will spend $600 million to deal with the flammable cladding crisis on apartments across the state.

Around 500 buildings need rectification work to be made safe.

The state government are committing to $300 million from existing funds, but they are hoping the other $300 million will come from the Federal government.

Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews has written to Prime Minister Scott Morrison to ask for the funds to fix the issue.

If the Coalition don't match the $300 million that has been requested, funds will be sourced from an increase to the building permit levy over the next five years. 

The new body, Cladding Safety Victoria, will oversee the fund and will be getting to work within the next few weeks on the 15 highest risk buildings.
 
Planning Minister Richard Wynee said it's just as much about safety as it is about fairness for people who bought apartments in good faith and were let down by dodgy builders or dangerous building products.

The move is among 35 recommendations made to the Victorian Government after 2,227 buildings had been inspected as of July 5.

Of those, 7 per cent were rated as an extreme risk, 40 per cent a high risk and 38 per cent moderate risk.

The data, presented at an industry conference, showed one evacuation order had been issued for a private building.

Emergency orders for urgent works were made on 51 properties with building notices issued on a further 387. 

The 35 recommendations were made by the Victorian Cladding Taskforce, headed up by former Liberal premier Ted Baillieu and former Labor deputy premier John Thwaites.

The ABC reported Daniel Andrews said the state was also examining ways to recover some of the costs from people and business "who had done the wrong thing".

It could include laws to punish dodgy providers and so-called "phoenix companies" that set up for only one project, then shut down and made it hard for people to sue them.

It has also flagged a plan that would see the Government assume the right to sue industry on behalf of residents because class actions had failed.

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