Gray said the water leaks were posing a serious safety issue.
“We’ve had emails where customers have been around an electric shock from interacting with light switches,” he said.
“We’ve got water pouring out through [power outlets] and interacting with household electronics on the floor.
“We’ve had one of our customers reach out to say that his 18-month-old baby slipped on tiles in the ensuite when the burst had just happened and was taken to hospital.”
Gray said similar faults had occurred on homes in Victoria, and he expected the number of reports to rise.
“We talk about it being the tip of the iceberg, because we think it’s only a matter of time before the issue spreads and people start to pick up and notice that across the rest of Australia,” he said.
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“If 10 per cent of the workforce was dedicated to repipes it would take 11 to 12 years and tie up 50 per cent of the state’s rentals.
“Despite our size we’re simply not equipped to deal with this volume of bursts, especially not in an environment that is as trade-constrained as Western Australia.”
The Iplex pipes in question were fitted in about 30,000 homes in Australia between 2017 and 2022.
An investigation by Building and Energy into the mass failure of plumbing pipes used in hundreds of new homes in Perth laid the blame on a manufacturing fault from a particular brand of polybutylene pipe, known as Pro-fit, made by Iplex Australia.
Building and Energy carried out inspections at more than 50 properties where pipe failures occurred and found that installation work practices and workmanship were not the cause of the pipe failures.
On Wednesday, ASX100-listed company Fletcher Building, which pipe manufacturer Iplex is part of, entered into a trading halt pending an announcement.
The company stopped selling its Pro-fit brand of pipes on May 31 last year.
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https://www.watoday.com.au/national/western-australia/bgc-braces-for-700-million-plumbing-bill-over-deluge-of-faulty-pipes-20231011-p5ebjf.html
