Business View Oceania - Mar 2024

organisations who supply goods and services to the industry. RVA lists their principal objective as: “To promote a quality living environment for its members and their residents.” Key areas of work include lobbying and representation, annual conferences and forums, information, education, and publications, and discount and benefits provision. RVA offers Provisional ad Accredited village memberships, and Associate memberships for non-villages. Members are bound by minimum standards for quality control and accountability purposes: Compliance with the Retirement Villages Act 2003, the related regulations promulgated under that Act, the Retirement Villages Code of Practice (as amended from time to time) and the Code of Residents’ Rights (‘the legislation’); Completion of,and provision to all intending residents, of a Summary of Key Terms; and Compliance with Best Practice Guidelines for Disclosure of the Right to Transfer to Care within a Retirement Village. A full list of membership benefits is available on the RVA website. CEO John Collyns shares his valuable insight into RVA’s background, purpose, projects, and future plans. “In the late 80s, our association pioneers decided they need to have a regulatory body to create some industry standards, because right then it was a very new industry that didn’t have its own framework. A year or so later, they developed the industry standards, which then morphed into our current legislative code of practice. The Retirement Villages Act was passed in 2003, from which the code of practice and so forth came into effect. Its final iteration was in 2007, which is when I joined the association. Our role to date has primarily been to get outcomes from government policy which are beneficial to our members, and that includes both local government through resource management type issues, consuming and campaigning issues, and from central government specifically around retirement legislation, but also other legislation which impacts on the industry, such as building standards, employment law, etc.” Design and construction challenges have made physical development and expansions difficult for RVA members, Mr. Collyns says. “This is an issue 53 BUSINESS VIEW CARIBBEAN VOLUME 06, ISSUE 03 RET IREMENT VI LLAGE ASSOCIAT ION OF NEW ZEALAND (RVA)