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Mascot Towers is most ‘poorly built’ building ever seen

NSW building commissioner David Chandler slams Mascot Towers. Source: AAP/realestate.com.au
NSW building commissioner David Chandler slams Mascot Towers. Source: AAP/realestate.com.au

New South Wales’ building commissioner, David Chandler, has slammed Mascot Towers’ building design, after residents were forced from their homes earlier this year.

Chandler told a Parliamentary inquiry into the building industry that the engineering design of the Mascot Towers was “poor”.

“I’ve built a lot of buildings, and I have to say when I walked across that job yesterday I don’t think I’ve seen many buildings as poorly built as that,” Chandler said.

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“Second of all, I’m quite certain that the builder didn’t know how to read any construction plans, because the faults that are in that building are simply [from] someone who didn’t pay any attention to them.”

“The control joints and cracking that’s in there are fixable, but it’s going to take a lot of work to fix,” Chandler said.

"I'm embarrassed, frankly, that the industry has allowed a product like Mascot Towers to turn up on the marketplace."

The commissioner expressed his sympathies for the residents of the building.

“If I was one of those residents, I would be putrid. I would be absolutely putrid.”

Mascot Tower residents face $10 million repair bill

Residents, who were evacuated in June following persistent cracking throughout the building, will face costs of around $10 million - after the repair bill was initially touted to be $5.5 million.

That means each owner in the 132-unit building will face an individual cost of $76,000, which they say they cannot afford.

"Personally, I cannot even afford to pay the monthly strata loan for stage 1,” one apartment-owner told The AFR earlier this month.

“My unit cannot be rented out and apart from this bill, I also have to pay my home loan, water, council and the strata fees."

"I wish the government would assist us immediately by offering us a low interest loan but it doesn’t look like that the political will is there.”

The NSW government has provided residents of the building assistance for temporary accommodation for up to three months, but the commissioner warned repairs would take much longer than that.

With AAP.

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