Families welcome CTV findings

Police and volunteers work to rescue people trapped in the collapsed CTV building after the earthquake. Photo / Geoff Sloan

Families of Canterbury Television building collapse victims have welcomed the findings of a royal commission into the building's collapse.

The findings will be released publicly later today but the families of all 115 victims were given copies of the report over the weekend.

They also met Attorney-General Christopher Finlayson and Minister for Building and Construction Maurice Williamson in Christchurch yesterday to go through the Canterbury Earthquakes Royal Commission report into the February 22 disaster.

The report, to be publicly released at 3pm, comes after the intensive eight-week hearing which heard testimony from more than 80 witnesses, including collapse survivors, eyewitnesses, building designers, architects, engineers, builders, and inspectors.

During the hearings, concerns were raised over the 1986 design of the concrete Madras St structure, as well as issues over its construction, failure to meet building code standards of the day, a 1991 retrofit to strengthen identified weaknesses, and how it became green-stickered after the September 4, 2010 shake.

Quake Families spokesman Brian Kennedy, whose wife Faye died in the six-storey office block collapse, was pleased with the comments made by ministers Mr Finlayson and Mr Williamson yesterday, especially a Government commitment to meet families in future to give them a "progress report" on implementing the recommendations.

He received a copy of the report on Saturday and was happy with what he read.

"I went straight the recommendations and they are pretty much what I expected," he said.

"All the obvious things have been pointed out and I feel quite content now."

With the release of the report, he felt it was now time to move on.

"After the royal commission hearings, I'd decided enough is enough," Mr Kennedy said.

"My daughters were very expressive when I said I was stepping back. They didn't particularly want me to front the media but I just felt I had to.

"I feel that I've done my bit, and it's now time to move on."