New rules for engineers after probe into deadly Christchurch quake building

New Zealand engineers will be legally obliged to report building faults following the collapse of a building that killed 115 people -- most of them young students from Asia -- in the February 2011 Christchurch earthquake.

Building and Housing Minister Nick Smith on Wednesday tabled in Parliament a strengthened code of conduct for engineers requiring them to inform regulatory authorities of serious deficiencies in buildings or structures.

The changes, which take effect from July 1, also require engineers to inform authorities if they believe other engineers have violated the code.

"The tragedy of the CTV building, which claimed the lives of 115 people when it collapsed, is that engineers had identified flaws in its design. This was many years earlier during a pre-purchase check, but this information was not passed on to regulatory authorities," Smith said in a statement.

"The code will make plain that this obligation overrides any commercial contract or confidentiality agreement with a client. This change is an important step in improving New Zealand's engineering systems and safety in managing complex risks, such as earthquakes."

The New Zealand Police are still investigating the collapse of the CTV building.

A report by the Canterbury Earthquakes Royal Commission of Inquiry detailed how the six-storey building, which was designed in 1986 and completed around 1988, had a "design that was deficient in a number of important respects" and should never have been issued with a construction permit because it failed to comply with building regulations.

The commission also found the building was never properly structurally assessed after being damaged in strong earthquakes on Sept. 4 and Dec. 26, 2010, despite being inspected by three building officials.

Most of the 185 people killed in the 6.3-magnitude quake of February 2011 died in the building when it collapsed and caught fire.

The CTV victims included 64 Asian students studying at an English language school: 17 students from the Chinese mainland, 28 from Japan, 10 from the Philippines, six from Thailand, two from the Republic of Korea, and one from China's Taiwan.

The New Zealand government bought the CTV site in 2014 and plans to include it in a mainly residential area on the edge of the city's new central business district. Endit