Chermside unit owners have been left to contend with severe damp, wall cracking and bulging after the Queensland Civil and Administration Tribunal found it would be "unfair" to direct the builder to rectify the issues.
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The body corporate for HQ Apartments, on Playfield Street, took Jadecorp to the Queensland Building and Construction Commission after the defects were discovered, seeking rectification work to be undertaken.
But the commission ruled against the body corporate, saying it would be unfair to the builder to be made to fix the problems, which arose in October 2010 – 19 months after the building was completed.
A competent builder, it was found, would not have been able to detect the defect.
The issues related to the products used in the walls of the building, rather than the quality of the building work itself.
The body corporate appealed to QCAT, but tribunal member Jeremy Gordon upheld the QBCC's decision.
"It would not have been apparent to a reasonably competent builder without making tests, that AFS Logic Wall Systems panels used magnesium oxychloride boards for the formwork rather than fibro cement boards," he said.
The boards used in the building's walling system were found to absorb moisture from the surrounding atmosphere, a defect the QBCC found could not have been detected by Jadecorp.
"The fact is that the boards used in the walling system were highly hygroscopic, and this meant that they had attracted moisture from the atmosphere and this had happened despite the properly applied coatings to the exterior and interior walls," Mr Gordon said.
"The resulting cracking, bulging and delamination of the boards would then have permitted further water ingress.
"The view I have reached, therefore, is that I cannot agree with the third main argument put forward by the body corporate that the true culprit for the problems in the building was the failure of the builder to properly seal and waterproof the building."
Mr Gordon said the walling system was "in common use" and Jadecorp was "contractually entitled" to use it.
"Whilst it is possible that Jadecorp may be contractually responsible for the defect in the materials, in these circumstances it would be clearly unfair to Jadecorp to direct that it rectify the ... defects," he said.
