Branz has a purpose-built fire lab at its Wellington campus. (Image: BRANZ)The Government’s plan to axe a dedicated levy paying for building research and make funding in the space more contestable is “a couple of good ideas conflated into a bad one”, a construction sector leader says.A proposed law change will end the levy charged on construction projects since 1969 to fund the Building Research Association of New Zealand (Branz).Instead, it will be combined with another levy collected by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE), with research supported out of that, Building Ministe...