A civil claim between insurance companies has ended in the High Court at Christchurch with Justice Rachel Dunningham ordering the council and Invercargill engineer Tony Major to pay $16.9 million.
Mr King yesterday said Justice Dunningham found the council was 10% responsible for the collapse and Mr Major was 90% responsible.
The council's liability arose from the issuing of a code compliance certificate which, from an administrative perspective, should not have been issued without more supporting information.
Because the council had full insurance cover, the total cost to ratepayers was a $10,000 claim excess which had already been paid, he said yesterday.
The council had already changed its procedures to ensure there was no repeat of the compliance issue, he said.
The council's insurer is Riskpool, a trust fund created by New Zealand local authorities to provide professional indemnity and public liability protection. Mr King said Riskpool might end up paying most or all of the judgement if Mr Major was unable to meet his contribution.
''My understanding is Mr Major is unlikely to be able to meet his contribution [although] I assume he would have had public liability insurance of his own.''
Mr Major could not be contacted for comment yesterday. The civil action was taken by IAG, insurers for the Southland Outdoor Stadium Trust.
In a statement, Heaney and Partners, the law firm acting for Riskpool, said an appeal was being considered because of the significant implications the judgement had for councils and their ratepayers throughout New Zealand, ''who routinely relied on producer statements from professionals involved in complex construction projects''.
