Damage to a small business on the corner of Barbadoes and
Salisbury Streets after the earthquake
Cabinet will today meet to get an early overview of the
damage caused by the Canterbury earthquake, and Prime Minister
John Key says the bill outside private insurance and Earthquake
Commission funding will be large.
Mr Key surveyed damage caused by the 7.1 magnitude quake on
Saturday afternoon and said it was an eerie feeling walking
around Christchurch and observing families as they took in
the scale of the disaster.
"Also you could see they were feeling quite stressed from the
night before and a little fearful of the aftershocks that
they knew were coming," he told TVNZ's Breakfast programme.
There were several aftershocks overnight.
"I know lots of families slept in the middle of the lounge on
the Saturday night wanting to be together."
He said Cabinet would today get an update on all the
different issues being presented. "And there are some
practical micro things happening, for instance, the Ministry
of Social Development are contacting all their elderly
clients to make sure that people are okay. ACC are contacting
those with serious injuries..."
He said there was plenty of damage to infrastructure such as
roading and wastewater, and the burden of repairing it would
need to be spread.
"It was previously paid for by the ratepayers of the
Canterbury region, and quite frankly the Government is going
to have to step up and I think wear a majority of that cost,
simply because if we don't do that the people of Canterbury
have to pay, because they need that infrastructure."
Mr Key said a lot of the cost of damage to buildings would be
met by the Earthquake Commission -- up to $100,000 per
building and $20,000 for contents -- and private insurance.
However, there were cases where some had heavy damage to
their homes yet didn't have private insurance.
Such situations presented a difficult issue and would be part
of the Cabinet's discussions today, Mr Key said.
He said from what he had seen, Civil Defence had responded
well to the crisis.
"By the time I got to Christchurch it was a very slick
operation."
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