NSW Health nudges the needle on reno rules

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Health NSW has acknowledged (but only just) that strata residents deserve a bit more protection from noise and potential covid-19 transmission, in its latest Covid-19 advisory.

Nudging the needle on protections for strata residents, after some pressure from Fair Trading (we are told), NSW Health says tradespeople working in apartment buildings  should minimise the time spent in common property areas such as lobbies, lifts and car parks, and they and the renovating owners might, if they feel like it, check that the work is OK with the strata committee.

Previous restrictions on a maximum of two workers per unit (not per apartment block) and workers not being in the same room as residents, still apply for work being done in the non-hot spot areas of the Greater Sydney.

The actual wording of the NSW Health notice says:

If you are doing prescribed work at a unit within a residential apartment building, you must ensure that

no more than 2 people are working inside a unit at the same time

a resident should stay in a separate indoor area to where the work is being carried out in their unit and

no more than 5 people are working in an outdoor area at the same time.

Residents and workers in residential apartment buildings seeking to arrange access to perform prescribed work are strongly encouraged to contact their Owners Corporation or Strata Manager to check any additional rules which may apply to a particular residential apartment building for access.  

Workers should

minimise time spent in any indoor common property areas and

wear a face mask at all times.

In my experience, “strongly encouraged” in tradie terms, means “if you can be bothered but why kick the wasp nest?”

And, of course, none of this applies to hobby self-renovators inspired by the new season of The Block.

Here’s what NSW Health should be doing – and it’s a simple one-point plan:

  1. No renovations are allowed in buildings where people are forced to stay home either for work or the purposes of the lockdown.

That’s it.  It’s all you need.  It worked in Melbourne and it could and should work here. However, we know that NSW Health really doesn’t get strata living and our friends at Fair Trading seem to be unable to educate them, so here is a compromise plan.

If there are residents staying in an apartment block in which there are units for which work has been planned …

  1. Owners must have a signed approval from their strata committee or strata manager to undertake the work.
  2. Workers must provide a photo ID, such as a driving license, that proves they are not currently or normally resident in one of the restricted LGAs.
  3. The tradespeople must provide a work noise plan that restricts intrusive noise such as drilling or cutting to no more than two hours per working day.
  4. Intrusive noise periods to be defined in advance, notified to other residents 24 hours in advance and not deviated from.
  5. Noisy work must not start before 8am or continue after 5pm.
  6. All work must cease at weekends.
  7. The above restrictions also apply to DIY home renovators.
  8. Failure to abide by these rules will be a breach of the Public Health Orders and can be enforced by police.

Okay, I hear some of you say, those restrictions would make a lot of renovations impossible. What’s more important – that an absentee owner gets a new kitchen in their rental property, or the people all around it can work and rest in peace?

For those of you who are thinking two hours a day is way too much, at least if you knew when it was coming, you could plan to be outside, exercising or just taking a walk.

It’s tenants that you have to really feel sorry for. They have no say in how their buildings are run and if they are in a block mostly owned by investors, there will be no one around with any power to protect them.

The vast majority of blocks in Sydney don’t have building mangers and a huge proportion, 40 to 50 per cent, don’t even have strata managers. 

In a majority investment block, the members of the committee might not even live there and they may well put the desires of property owners ahead of the needs of residents.

As for by-laws, many building have no restrictions on noisy work or negligible limits such as – believe it or not – “not on Sunday mornings”.

So for NSW Health to say residents should talk to their building managers and committees, and use common sense, betrays a breathtaking lack of knowledge or concern, bordering on ignorance-fuelled arrogance.

There are too many people living in strata who have zero say in the way their homes are run. NSW needs to start listening to strata residents, and act accordingly.

Or should we wait until a family or an individual is forced out of their flat by noise and gets fined for breaching the rules or, even worse, comes into contact with an infected person and starts their own little covid cluster?

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