Good morning ladies and gentlemen

It's a pleasure to be here.

I am delighted to be able to announce to you that the government is conducting a number of regulatory reviews which I am sure many of you have been seeking.

And which will be of great benefit to the property sector. 

The Minister of Finance and I have taken papers to Cabinet which has approved reviews of the Building Act, the 2nd stage of the RMA, and the Overseas Investment Act.

Terms of reference for the reviews are required to be finalised by the 30th of April.

In addition, a special parliamentary committee is reviewing the Emissions Trading Scheme. 

Parliament wants to know what the costs and benefits of the ETS are.  So do I!

Heaven knows, in these stormy times, businesses can do with some good news.

I've read the "Roadmap for Reform" document which the Property Council put out last year.

It's a pretty big and ambitious wish list of changes and improvements you'd like to see.

Good on you, I say.

Be bold and think big.

Since it was written, though, the world economy's gone into a tailspin.

To my mind, that merely gives more urgency to the reforms outlined in the document.

These are unprecedented times.

For the nation, and the government, it is not business as usual.

So how can we help?

Well, after just three months, I believe we are making changes and carrying out reforms that will make a big difference, not just to property owners, managers and investors...

But to businesses and individual New Zealanders as well.

The Roadmap talks about the stampede to re-regulation which occurred under the former Labour-administration, and the harm it's done.

We're well on the way to stopping that stampede.

And introducing some much needed commonsense.

New Zealand is over regulated.

The government has got too big.

Resources have been draining from the productive sectors into the state sector, which has been dragging the economy and the country down.

Red tape is tying up businesses in knots, in particular those in building, construction or property.

Every time you try to anything in a building you own, you run foul of the building regulations.

The practice of imposing more and more obligations onto businesses and councils must stop.

Because businesses have to pass on those costs to consumers, whereas councils pass them on to ratepayers and consent applicants.

Businesses big and small are drowning in bureaucracy.

Over the past few years there has been an avalanche of new rules and regulations.

No wonder people gave up on projects - saying "it's too hard."

That has to stop.

It's been dragging the country down.

When ACT went into its support agreement with National after the election last November, I took on my two ministerial portfolios - Local Government and Regulatory Reform...

Because these are important areas that affect people and their communities in so many ways.

They're also areas in real need of change.

Here's what I want to achieve.

I have three primary goals.

First, I want to keep rate rises down and encourage councils to focus on core activities.

On the necessities, not the luxuries.

On rubbish removal, water supply, roads, parks.

Businesses pay a huge percentage of council rates.

It's one of your biggest costs and I think you can get better value for money.

Second, I want greater transparency and accountability in local government.

Right now, council processes are murky and confusing.

For example we don't know who at the ARC is responsible for the $1.8 million Beckham fiasco. 

The audit Office has had to be called in to find out who is responsible.

We need to know who to hold to account.

My third aim is to cut the red tape that's strangling businesses, and driving ordinary people and homeowners crazy.

I want to see fewer of the absurd compliance demands in the regulatory area.

And the financial burden placed by central government on local government reduced.

A whole raft of excessive charges, and unnecessary restrictions, is having the combined effect of killing businesses.

For the country, it has the effect of lowering the productivity on which our standard of living relies.

It's death by a thousand cuts.

Regulatory reform is urgently needed.

Most of you will be aware of the reforms to the Resource Management Act, announced recently.

It's a good start but it's just stage one.

There'll be more work on the RMA and related issues.

Environment Minister Nick Smith will discuss those in detail with your Chief Executive later this morning.

We'll be reviewing the Act in the future to make it less prescriptive and restrictive.

It will be streamlined and simplified, as will the processes associated with it.

I would like to see legal responsibility - and liability - taken away from councils and placed back where it should be, on the industry and on individual contractors or suppliers.

They have the expertise and incentives to manage it properly.

The reason councils are so incredibly demanding is they're now paranoid about the possibility of being considered - or found - negligent some time in the future about any decision they make on minor as well as major building projects.

It is appropriate that they're are stringent and demanding in many areas involving safety and reliability of structures, to prevent leaky buildings for example.

And there should be a desire to continually improve our communities.

But it's gone too far and it's got to stop.

Reform of the building regulations will, I am sure, make a great deal of difference to your sector. 

And hopefully play a part in allowing you to ride through these turbulent times and come out the other side as flourishing businesses.

The Local Government Act is also long overdue for review.

So that's on the agenda.

It's responsible for a lot of the foolishness and waste by councils.

Far too many new obligations, with associated costs, have been passed on to local government - which in turn passes them on to ratepayers, or anyone applying for a building or resource consent.

However although, as I say, these pieces of legislation are responsible for the much of the absurdities, councils themselves must bear part of the blame.

They have become very risk-averse and over zealous.

In particular, the way they interpret legislation - and extend the ridiculous controls into micro areas of a project.

Costs, charges and fees keep being raised way beyond what is reasonable or justifiable.

Three thousand dollars for a consent to build a ten thousand dollar Skyline garage is absurd.

The paperwork's gone crazy too.

Up to fifty pages of paperwork is needed for councils to approve a garage - whereas two or three used to be enough.

Make no mistake - I accept councils do a lot of good work.

But they have become a block on growth in this country.

We are in a very tough situation economically and we must do everything we can to help businesses flourish and grow.

By cutting costs and the red tape.

I want to free up businesses to do what they do best.

Create wealth, opportunity and jobs.

These are challenging times.

We need to lift our game substantially.

And I believe there are very real economic gains to be made in the regulatory area.

Reform is needed, and I promise you change is going to come.

Thank you.