Key Takeaways:
- Government inaction has left owners corporations facing massive bills with no clear policy or transparency. Residents are still waiting for accountability.
- Only 15 of more than 1,000 dangerous buildings have received funding while the real budget sits at just $150 million. The crisis remains far from resolved.
- Apartment owners who did nothing wrong are carrying the burden with potential fines of up to $400,000. The government and industry have walked away from responsibility.
We are still waiting for a coherent government policy on combustible cladding that can provide clarity for owners’ corporations (OCs) facing massive bills for rectification.
More and more buildings are getting caught up in the nightmare, receiving building orders with no appropriate follow-up, and no end in sight.
In 2018, the government’s ill-fated attempt to introduce a loan scheme ended barely 12 months later. The government itself deemed the scheme unworkable, something which We Live Here had pointed out to them, long before the scheme was introduced into Parliament.
In July 2019, Cladding Safety Victoria (CSV) was established by the Premier of Victoria and the Minister for Planning. CSV was tasked with the responsibility for rectifying higher risk buildings identified by the Victorian Building Authority (VBA) through a state-wide cladding audit.
What did the Victorian cladding audits find and are the results publicly available?
Would you like to know the outcome of the audits? Sorry, it seems we residents do not have that privilege. Nowhere can we find any information on the outcome of the audits.
A map on the VBA website shows the number of audits carried out within each municipality and we can see that more than 2200 audits have been conducted in Melbourne.
And that’s about all you can glean from the VBA cladding webpage.
The government needs to communicate much better than this.
For a start we want the Premier and the Minister for Planning to answer these questions:
- What criteria are used to deem a building to be high, moderate or low risk?
- What was the determining factor for the 15 buildings selected for government funding?
- What happens to the owners in the other 1054 cladding-affected buildings identified by the VBA as being a danger to life? Are these buildings suddenly no longer a danger to life?
- Why the secrecy – can we please have some honesty?
- We apartment owners inherited the problem created by dodgy construction and reckless government oversight.
How many buildings in Victoria have received government funding for cladding rectification?
Congratulations! Of the 1069 buildings in Victoria identified with cladding that is a “danger to life” – 15 will benefit from the government’s meagre munificence.
To the other 1054 buildings who played the game, thanks for investing your life savings in your residence – and good luck with that!
This outcome proves what we have been saying for many months – the state government has not been able to raise enough money to make any meaningful impact on the massive extent of the cladding scandal.
And it proves our oft-repeated allegations that the real budget figure has always been: $150 million – not the risible $600 million figure that made a really great sound bite, swallowed whole by the mainstream media last year.
You can find evidence of the government’s figure of $150 million in the State’s Treasury papers and the same figure is confirmed by the Baillieu-Thwaites report – albeit in small print. The figure of $600 million is as fake and as meaningless as the 1069 certificates of occupancy that the government authorised for buildings with flammable cladding.
What are the penalties for owners corporations that fail to comply with a cladding building order?
Failure to comply with a Building Order to undertake rectification works, is an offence pursuant to section 118(1) of the Building Act (1993). For a body corporate, the maximum penalty is just over $400,000. If your OC is charged with an offence under the Act, the matter would be heard in the Magistrates Court.
It is a no-win situation and frankly a disgrace that the government should yet again ignore the thousands of owner-occupiers who live in high-rise strata communities.
This is a scandal of monumental proportions. And the culpable parties – the government and the building industry – are trying to get away with it.
How should an owners corporation manager support a Committee through cladding rectification?
Combustible cladding remediation can involve consultants, contractors, building orders, owner communication and significant financial decisions.
If your Committee feels unsupported, experiences poor communication or struggles to get clear guidance from its current manager, it may be time to review your management arrangements.
When you are considering changing managers, visit us and speak with a consultant about your options here.
