Section 198 and section 197 of the Strata Schemes Management Act 2015 outline the obligations of the building inspector which include that the building inspector:
- has a duty to act impartially in the course of carrying out the functions of a building inspector,
- will not seek or accept, or offer or agree to accept, any benefit of any kind, whether on their own behalf or on behalf of any other person,
- does not represent the interests of the developer when undertaking their functions as a building inspector,
- must act within their competencies and engage additional specialists required to inspect and report on the areas outside of the building inspector’s competencies. (Any person engaged by a building inspector must be independent of the stakeholders in the construction of the relevant building work),
- must disclose previous employment by the developer or a contractor of the developer that occurred at any time within the period of 2 years before appointment as a building inspector (See also Regulation 46 of the Strata Schemes Management Regulation 2016), and
- must not be or was at any time in the 2 years immediately before the appointment, “connected” with the developer.
Section 197 and section 7 of the Strata Schemes Management Act 2015 and Regulation 62 of the Strata Scheme Management Regulation 2016 define what is meant by “connected”.
Members should familiarise themselves with the definition of “connected”.