John Key

By Maggie Tait of NZPA

Wellington, Sept 6 NZPA - Consent processes will be streamlined and money pulled from different areas to speed up recovery work following the devastation that Saturday's morning's earthquake wreaked on Canterbury.

More than 100,000 houses were damaged, as well as roads, businesses and farmland, by the magnitude 7.1 earthquake.

Prime Minister John Key today announced that Cabinet Minister Gerry Brownlee had been given ministerial responsibility for the recovery so he could "knock heads" together and have the authority to sweep away bureaucratic roadblocks. A special commissioner may be appointed to run the recovery later on.

Finance Minister Bill English will be involved too. "The main issue will be making sure the banks and IRD are cooperative with local businesses," Mr Key said.

"It's very important we don't put those businesses under."

Treasury believed the economy would be affected, but it would be short term as stimulus from the recovery work kicked in.

Mr Key said there would be a huge number of claims and Earthquake Commission (EQC) processing would need to be quick while Resource Management Act consents would also be "streamlined".

Local mayors and Government ministers would discuss options such as setting up a system where approved providers could push on with the work as long as they guaranteed they would not price gouge.

While resources would be pumped into the area, Mr Key warned people to be realistic. "Do I think a year from now is it likely construction will still be going on to rectify damage that took place on Friday night? The answer is yes."

Funds and support would be available -- the Government today said it would put $5 into a mayoral relief fund, while people unable to work because of the quake were unlikely to face welfare stand-down periods and Work and Income processing would be done quickly.

The mayoral fund would be available on a case by case basis and the Government wanted to send a clear message that people should make sure they got insurance.

The fund might be used, for example, to pay for elderly people with little income to have their homes repaired. "That's a scenario where we would need to go away and look at that position."

Tomorrow Mr Key will talk to local mayors about how the fund will operate.

"The very large contributions the Crown will end up making in terms of infrastructure, which is primarily owned and controlled by local government, roading, local roads, water, waste water -- the costs of that will run to the hundreds of millions of dollars and won't come out of the mayoral fund."

It would take time to establish what the liability was -- estimates have put it over $1 billion. Models based on past events like cyclones show Government would have to pick up most of the bill for any uninsured infrastructure.

Mr Key said $94m will be made available immediately from the emergency works fund for road repairs.

The number left homeless is still unknown, but 250 people are in welfare centres.

Officials are inspecting state houses and all schools and ringing elderly people to check on their well being. Trauma support is to be made available for stressed locals.

The army is assisting, helping with food and accommodation for people arriving in the city to assist.

"I think that involvement will continue for a while," Mr Brownlee said.

Cabinet Minister Simon Power will look after Mr Brownlee's duties as Leader of the House while he is in Christchurch and the usually combative question time scheduled for tomorrow will be dropped while local MPs will be allowed to go home to help and not lose voting rights.

Mr Key said he was satisfied with the response to the quake by his ministers and authorities.

"I personally think it was a very slick operation and it worked extremely well."

A routine inquiry would be held to learn any lessons.

He will be heading to Europe on Friday but did not rule out cancelling that.

"If at the end of the day my time can be better used back here I will stay."