NSW’s freshly appointed building commissioner says a culture of doing the bare minimum has taken root in parts of the Australian construction sector, driving building non-compliance and defects.
“We have a culture in our building community that it’s OK just to sort of do the minimum standard with some work,” the former Transport for NSW executive said. “The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago and the second-best time is today, right? I think that’s the same thing for this regulation,” he said.
He said his greatest challenge was restoring community confidence in the quality of new construction, with consumers not buying apartments off the plan. The commission had a “big education piece” to address this, he said.