The Auckland City Council says too much money is being spent on lawyers in leaky home settlements.
The council has paid $11 million to settle claims in the past financial year, and another $3.5 million for legal and professional fees.
The council's finance and strategy committee chairperson, Doug Armstrong, says the Government needs to speed up negotiations to establish how much different parties would pay in any settlement. He says that that would rule out lengthy legal disputes.
However, a lawyer for about 6000 leaky-home owners, Paul Grimshaw, says lawyers are not rorting their clients and owners should not have to pay towards a claim.
Local Government New Zealand says it has already rejected a Government offer as unaffordable.
