Social Housing Reform (Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters Amendment) Bill

I move, That the Social Housing Reform (Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters Amendment) Bill be now read a third time. This bill was introduced as part of Budget 2013. It is about creating a far more innovative approach to the way in which we deliver social housing for New Zealanders, and also ensuring that it is the families that have the greatest need that have priority for the Government’s large investment in housing.

I want to begin by thanking and acknowledging colleagues who have played a significant role in getting to this point: my predecessor, Phil Heatley, and the chair of the Social Services Committee, Sam Lotu-Iiga. I also want to acknowledge my Associate Minister of Housing, Paula Bennett, who has a huge role to play in ensuring that we get the Ministry of Social Development working more effectively with Housing New Zealand in the provision of housing. I also want to acknowledge the intellectual architects of this bill who were involved in the Home and Housed: A Vision for Social Housing in New Zealand report from 2009, who really have applied their minds to the question of how New Zealand can lift its game in this area. I also want to acknowledge the hard work of both the Parliamentary Counsel Office and the officials from a number of Government agencies, who have put an enormous amount of work into these reforms.

These are the biggest changes that have occurred in 75 years in the way in which the Government provides housing for our citizens with the greatest need. It is about three very significant changes. The first of those is saying that the Government does not need to own the bricks and mortar for it to be able to provide social housing and for the community housing sector to open up to have access to income-related rents. The second substantive reform is saying that it makes far more sense for the Ministry of Social Development—which is already responsible for providing income support for families, which also administers the nearly $2 billion a year that is spent on the accommodation supplement, and which provides special-needs grants for people to be able to get bonds for housing—to simultaneously be doing the assessment function associated with provision of social housing. The bill also includes the provisions for reviewable tenancies, which are absolutely crucial if our State housing stock is to be used by those with the highest need.

I do have to say that I was disappointed during the Committee stage by the contribution from the Opposition, which has on so many housing issues been so contradictory. For instance, Labour members have called for the Government to do something about increasing housing supply. We then took measures to increase housing supply, including a housing accord that was unanimously agreed to by Auckland Council, and members opposite have done everything they can to oppose and to try to stall the provision of that housing. I find it equally ironic around the issue of loan-to-value ratios from the Reserve Bank, where last year Labour was calling for the Reserve Bank to take such measures, and for the last 6 months has been doing everything it can to oppose them. Exactly the same has to apply to this social housing reform bill. I have heard speech after speech from Labour members saying that they support the community social housing sector, and yet they oppose the game-changing bill that this is, which will actually enable the community social housing sector to play a much expanded role in addressing the housing challenges that New Zealand faces.

This bill does provide for the provision of a market in social housing. It enables the Government to partner with community housing providers by making those providers eligible to receive the income-related rent subsidy that, to date, has been available to only those people who live in a State house. That is a big change. The income-related rent subsidy currently stands at nearly $700 million per year, and it is a very significant change.

In Budget 2013 we have made provision for $27 million for community housing providers, as well as the $139 million that we have put into the Social Housing Fund to give a kick-start to that social housing sector. A very important part of this Government’s programmes is around better, smarter public services.

💬 Hon Annette King: Oh, yeah!

We have not had the fiscal room, as Annette King interjects, to spend like there is no tomorrow, as occurred in Labour’s period in Government. Despite the huge economic boom that occurred during Labour’s period, and despite pouring huge sums of money into the public sector, it was a lazy Government that did not actually apply its mind to how you could have better and smarter public services. That is why this bill transfers—

💬 Hon Annette King: Show us something smarter that you’ve done.

The member asks what is smarter about it. I will tell you what is smarter. It is smarter for my constituents in Nelson who have housing need to know that there is a single Government agency, the Ministry of Social Development, that will assess their need for housing. That is different from what occurs right now, where a person is pushed from pillar to post between Housing New Zealand and the Ministry of Social Development. As a taxpayer I challenge members opposite. How does it make sense to have public servants working in two different agencies dealing with the same challenge of social housing need? That is why I say that this reform makes such good sense.

This bill also provides for reviewable tenancies. That is all about ensuring that the $16 billion that New Zealand taxpayers have invested in social housing is for those families that have the greatest need. There was a very telling point in the Committee stage. Annette King challenged me when I pointed out that in my own constituency I have got a person who did once have high need and who is now the captain of a fishing vessel, earning over $100,000 a year, living in a State house. I said that that was wrong, and I said that that house should be available for a person with higher housing need. Annette King said: “Well, what’s the Government been doing over the last 4 or 5 years?”. Well, actually, the Government has been developing this very reform bill, which will enable us to be able to give priority to families. The honest truth is that what members opposite are saying is that a person living in a State house and earning over $100,000 a year has got a legal right to stay in that house for ever while there are families with higher needs. That is why I say to members opposite: do not pretend that you have got a monopoly on caring. With that sort of social policy, members opposite should be honest that they are denying people with high needs access to the housing they need.

I also want to challenge members opposite in terms of the commitment by this Government to ensuring that our State housing is safe and is healthy. This Government has insulated 60,000 State houses—60,000—in 5 years. Labour did 4,000 in 9 years—4,000 in 9 years. How Labour members can get up in this House and lecture us that we do not care for State housing tenants defies belief. Equally, I look at the initiative I have announced in the last month—a commitment of $30 million by this Government to fencing and safety on driveways. Most New Zealanders and members of this House probably do not recognise that we actually kill more toddlers on driveways than by the very high-profile issue of violence, which we must also address. When I hear members opposite giving these lectures that they alone care for children, I ask what they did for 9 years when there were three reports that identified the safety of children in State houses. They did zip. I say that they have no monopoly on caring.

The very last point I want to make is that during the Committee stage, members opposite said that the $27 million that this Government had committed to supporting the community social housing sector was not enough. Well, I say to members opposite that that is $27 million more than they committed to the community housing sector in their 9 years.

This bill represents a bold and sensible reform consistent with the agenda of this Government of better public services, ensuring that our assets and income go to those most in need. I commend it to the House.

That Minister, Nick Smith, who has just resumed his seat, is the Minister who stayed on in his ministerial home for 6 weeks after he was sacked as a Minister. And what did he tell the public about why he stayed on? Because he did not want to interrupt his children’s schooling. Is his a high-needs family? Are they a high-needs family? Apparently, it is OK for Mr Smith’s family to stay in their house when he has lost his job. He had no right to stay in that house, and he did it because he did not want to interrupt his children’s schooling. That is an outrageous double standard. It is typical National—one standard for him and one standard for everybody else. He should be ashamed of himself. He did not want to disrupt his children’s schooling—

💬 Hon Dr Nick Smith: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

—but he is quite happy for the children of State house families—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order! There is a point of order. The Hon Dr Nick Smith.

💬 Hon Dr Nick Smith: It has been a long-held and strongly defended rule that the children of members of Parliament are not brought into the debate on contentious issues in this House. [Interruption]

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order! That is exactly right, and we will have no more of this. I will ask the member to continue. Families are not to be brought in to this debate.

It is an outrageous double standard that this Minister will happily impose insecurity of tenure on thousands and thousands of the most vulnerable families in our country while he applies a totally different standard to himself. He should be ashamed of himself.

Reviewable tenancies is the reason that Labour is opposing this bill, the Social Housing Reform (Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters Amendment) Bill. It will do incalculable damage to families in this country, who, quite frankly, deserve better. Expert submitters—the most distinguished public health researchers and academics—came along to the Social Services Committee and said that this Minister of Housing’s policy, which gives himself the power to throw senior citizens out of their houses simply because there are not enough State houses, will pose a public health risk.

The Minister’s own intellectual mentors, the Productivity Commission and the Housing Shareholders’ Advisory Group, came along and explicitly advised not to implement reviewable tenancies.

💬 Hon Dr Nick Smith: Not true. Not true.

They said it is bad policy, and that it would be bad for people. I do know not which side of his mouth the Minister is talking out of when he says it is not true, but it is there in black and white in their discussions. They opposed reviewable tenancies.

💬 Hon Dr Nick Smith: Not true.

The Minister stands up in this House and he says: “No, it is not true. These people are the intellectual architects of this policy.” Well, that is a load of hogwash, and it is breathtaking arrogance from that Minister. He says that everybody else has got it wrong and he is right. He has given himself the power in this bill, in this bit of legislation, to throw 80-year-olds out of their houses because there are not enough houses. That is an utter disgrace. We will not support that.

Let us look at this bill in the context of National’s stewardship of State housing policy. Let us look at National’s record. National members came in and tightened the eligibility criteria for State houses. At the stroke of a pen they got rid of half the waiting list, and the upshot of that is that all over provincial New Zealand there are hundreds of empty State houses. Perfectly good State houses are lying empty because this National Government has tightened the eligibility criteria so tightly that people who are living in poverty still cannot get a State house in many parts of provincial New Zealand.

What else has the Government done? It squeezed, for the first 3 years, as the Salvation Army report showed a few days ago, the financial lifeblood out of Housing New Zealand to pay for tax cuts for the rich. That is what it did. It sliced back the annual capital contribution by the Crown.

💬 Hon Dr Nick Smith: He knows that’s not true.

The figures do not lie, Dr Smith. You slashed the Crown’s capital contribution and you hiked the dividends so that over the first—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order!

Not you, Mr Assistant Speaker.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Well, you are bringing me into the debate.

I am talking about the Minister and his Government. In the first 3 years under their stewardship they actually withdrew a net financial amount of $142 million, in contrast to the Labour Government, which for the 8 years or 9 years prior actually made a net positive contribution of nearly half a billion dollars. What sort of Government milks the State social housing agency in the height of a housing crisis? I will tell you. It is the same kind of Government that stands up, delivers its Budget, and announces a target of evicting 3,000 State house tenants. That is National for you. That speaks volumes about its attitude to State house tenants.

What else has the Government done? In this bill it is shifting the eligibility assessment task to the Ministry of Social Development. It is extending the income-related rent subsidy to NGOs and, as we have said time and time again in this debate, Labour is not opposed to that. We are not opposed, in fact, to the Minister’s intention to shift housing stock across to the community housing providers. That makes sense, but we will not support it in the context of a diminishing pie. This Minister has overseen a reduction in the number of State houses in the last 2 years. There are 700 fewer State houses, and whenever he is asked about it he blathers on about the Christchurch earthquake. Well, the reduction in State houses happened after the Christchurch earthquake. He cannot blame the Christchurch earthquake for the reduction in State housing stock. He sits there shaking his head, but he knows that it is true.

The big lesson from the devolution of social services over the last two or three decades has been that if the funding does not follow the devolution of services and assets, then those services become unsustainable, the providers of those services get run ragged and constantly have to come back to the Government with a begging bowl, and it is the consumers, the recipients of those services, who suffer. We predict that that is what will happen under this National Government’s plan to run down, to wind back, Housing New Zealand, and to flick off 20 percent of the stock without a significant financial commitment to maintaining that stock. That is the track record of National, and we predict that it will happen again in this case.

The Minister’s vision is for a contestable market for social housing. What kind of planet is he on? We are talking about putting a roof over the heads of the most vulnerable people in New Zealand, and he wants to set up a contestable market where Housing New Zealand competes with the Salvation Army for tenants and subsidies. What absolute lunacy. Why would we think that National would do anything different? It has run down Housing New Zealand. It has used it as a—

💬 Hon Dr Nick Smith: Have not.

The Minister denies it, but the figures do not lie. The Minister has made a net financial withdrawal from Housing New Zealand of $142 million in the first 3 years. It is all there in black and white. The Government has used it as a cash cow to pay for its tax cuts. It has run down and reduced the number of State houses in the middle of a housing crisis, it has rewritten the eligibility criteria to cut the waiting list in half, and it has disenfranchised very poor people in provincial cities, who have been hived off into the private rental market where they are living in substandard and overcrowded conditions while State houses lie empty in the same streets.

The Government has committed $27 million over 4 years to the community housing sector, and, as the Salvation Army has pointed out, that is lacking in any kind of credibility in terms of backing that Minister’s claim to be committed to resourcing and empowering the community housing sector. With this bill National is washing its hands of responsibility for State house tenants.

This is just the latest chapter in National’s hostility to social housing and State housing. We have seen it all the way through the decades. We saw it in the 1990s, when it sold off 13,000 State houses and bumped up rents to market-related rents. This bill, as speakers earlier in the evening have pointed out, is just the latest move by National to wash its hands of responsibility for putting a roof over the heads of some of the poorest and most disadvantaged New Zealanders. We think that is a disgrace. From that Minister particularly it shows a breathtaking double standard. Labour is utterly opposed to this bill.

During the 2011 election campaign I was doing human hoardings in Panmure, at the Panmure roundabout, when a woman approached me. She asked me to go to her house, which I did that afternoon. There I saw a young woman who was 18, heavily pregnant, and living with her 2-year-old in the garage of this elderly woman’s home,. Her 2-year-old was half-clothed and dishevelled and had a heart condition. This young woman was due in hospital the next day to have her second child, at 18. It is these people whom this bill, the Social Housing Reform (Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters Amendment) Bill, and our Government hope to help. It is in this situation where we need to house people who are in the greatest need.

Thankfully, when she came out of hospital a week later, we had worked with Housing New Zealand to put her into a two-bedroom apartment with her two children. Yet the week before, in a street around the corner, I was at a place where a woman was living in a three-bedroom home. She had been there for over 40 years, her husband had passed away, and the kids had left home.

These two situations are the reason we need reviewable tenancies in this country. They are the reason we need to match the greatest need with the $16 billion in assets that the Minister of Housing has talked about. And Labour opposes it. Labour opposes putting those people who are in the greatest need into homes. This is not about ideology. This is not about productivity commissions. This is about real people in my electorate of Maungakiekie, whom I want to help. I am sure that members all around this Chamber have cases where they have seen people who are not being housed properly, whereas others are indefinitely in conditions, in homes, in which they do not need three bedrooms.

So I support this Minister because he is hard-working, he is honest, and he is diligent. He has brought in a piece of legislation that will help the New Zealanders who are the most vulnerable. That is what this bill does. So for members opposite to even claim that this is about kicking out disabled and elderly people—no, it is about reviewing their tenancies and making considered and informed decisions as to who in New Zealand has the highest needs.

💬 Louisa Wall: Where are they going to go?

The member opposite asks where they are going to go. Well, there were one-bedroom apartments down the road that could quite easily have housed that elderly woman who has lived in a Housing New Zealand home for over 40 years. Labour members do not like the truth. They do not like the fact that this bill will actually help people. It is about housing those with the highest needs.

This bill also works closely with the community housing sector in order to provide for those in need. We know that the community housing sector does a far better job than Housing New Zealand does to work with the needs of the disabled, to work with the needs of the mentally ill, and to have the wraparound services. That is why we are committing, with the Minister, $27 million more than the members opposite ever did in 9 years of overseeing the Treasury benches. So I say that that measure also has a positive impact on those families most in need.

Finally, I want to say that the third part of this bill that makes a real difference is about transferring the services around housing to the Ministry of Social Development. It is better placed to make those assessments. It is better placed because it deals on a daily basis with these people who have these high needs. That is why the transfer of these services makes logical sense. Again, the Minister has laid out a very compelling case as to why the Ministry of Social Development can do that better than Housing New Zealand.

I sum up by saying that this bill is about helping New Zealanders. It is not about ideologies. It is not about making personal, nasty attacks on members and their children in this House. It is about housing New Zealanders and it is about doing the best for those most in need and particularly for those vulnerable children. Thank you.

It is my pleasure to speak to the third reading of the Social Housing Reform (Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters Amendment) Bill. I think that it is really important at this point, amongst all of the rhetoric coming from the Government claiming that this is really about helping those who are currently State house tenants and those who may be prospective tenants in the future, that we add a layer of context, really, to this debate. But we must always remember that behind all of the statistics we tend to throw around in this House are individuals and people with their own stories and their own situations. I utterly accept that the member on the other side of the House, Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga, just shared his own. But to what degree do we sometimes forget even the context in which those stories exist?

We must remember that only 5 percent—5 percent—of our housing stock in New Zealand is State housing or community housing stock. That is an incredibly small proportion of housing stock. That is why currently in New Zealand 80 percent of the children who are living in poverty are not living in State or community houses—80 percent. A large number of the children whom the Government claims it is trying to protect do not actually currently live in those houses. That is not because they are being occupied by wealthy people who are unnecessarily taking State houses; it is simply because the demand is so high and because there are so many children currently living in poverty—270,000.

When the Minister of Housing makes out, as he did in one of his speeches, that 4,000 people are currently paying market rents for State houses and says that that must be indicative of there being people in State housing when they do not need State housing, I think that neglects to acknowledge the fact that not everyone in a State house is there simply because of income issues. There are people who live in State houses because they simply cannot get a house in the private rental market, for a whole list of reasons. It may in the past have been the case that community housing would pick up that need—for example, someone exiting prison, or someone with a range of issues that means it is hard for them to find a house in the private rental market.

I constantly see cases through my electorate office based in central Auckland where individuals are coming in because they simply cannot find a house because, for instance, they have a child and no one wants to rent to someone who has a child. They are renting in a market that is so competitive now that that is the kind of basis on which a private landlord is discriminating against families.

💬 Hon Judith Collins: It’s against the law.

Sure, the Minister may claim it is against the law, but it is just like the 90-day job trial. There is a whole host of reasons why people can get sacked from a job without getting any explanation, and the same goes for being denied a house. It is not that they are told that they are not getting a house because they have a child; they just do not get a phone call back. They do not even get a look in. So I am sorry, Minister Collins, but this is the real world and this is the existence that some people are experiencing.

💬 Hon Judith Collins: Then why don’t you do something about it, Jacinda, instead of whining?

What about—the fact that there are sole parents? How evil of them—for trying to raise their children on their own, and for merely existing. So that is the point we think we need to clearly make in this argument. Perhaps you are overstating this notion that there are people in our State houses who do not have those needs.

The other point I want to raise is that there will certainly be examples of tenants who recognise that they are not in the right house. In fact, I had someone a little while ago now come in to see me at the office, where, yes, I am a dirty old list MP. They came to see me, not the electorate MP, for some particular reason. They came to see me. This particular young woman had been living in a State house with her parents and her sibling for many years. Her parents, tragically, died at a very close distance to one another in timing.

So there she was, a very young woman herself—studying and now raising her sibling. She had a particular disability that made it hard for her to find steady employment. She recognised that she and her sibling did not require the large State house she was in any more, but it was in central Auckland. She had asked to go somewhere else, but the lack of State housing options meant that if she left that house, she would be sent to somewhere quite some distance away—up to half an hour away from where she currently was. That meant losing every connection she had in that community. That meant being plucked from her church community, the only neighbourhood she had ever known, and all of her support networks, as a young woman now trying to raise a younger sibling.

That is really, I think, indicative of the issue here. National members try to make what they are saying sound reasonable and fair, but in reality reviewable tenancies in a market where there are just no houses available means that some of these individuals are just being chucked into a circumstance where finding housing is going to be very, very difficult, particularly in the area where I live and particularly in view of the fact that there were 697 fewer State houses last year because of this Government selling off State houses. I know that in central Auckland the Government is hocking them off wildly. In fact, there are a number of houses where the Government just refuses to keep any upkeep going because they are all earmarked for sale. So as much as the Minister talks about the standard of State housing, he is deliberately running down stock in the knowledge that the Government is simply going to sell it.

We also know that there has been a significant reduction in capital contributions to State housing, and that is something that has been brought up by the Salvation Army. So yes, amongst all of this debate, yes, absolutely—Labour could have done more to ensure that the quality of our State housing stock was kept up. Yes, there is no denying it. But there is also no denying the fact that when we came into office, National had sold 13,000 State houses—13,000 State houses. You can hardly blame Labour at that time for being vehemently focused on trying to renew our State housing stock, because there was a massive gap when we came into office at that point.

So sure, the Government can talk about everything it has done on insulation—fantastic; not denying that that was incredibly important—but in doing so it refuses to acknowledge that in amongst all of that, it has been reducing the stock. It has been upgrading what we have got, but reducing the stock overall. So, again, the context in which we are debating this bill is a context in which actually we are simply dividing the pie amongst a larger number of people and the pie is getting smaller. That is why this idea of it simply being common sense to continually review tenancies refuses to acknowledge that actually the environment in which this Government is doing it means that people will be in very insecure, unstable situations as a consequence.

If the Minister claims that it is absolutely disgraceful to claim that this Government would throw out, for instance—well, two groups that we can easily identify are going to probably be on fixed incomes: those with long-term disabilities, for instance, who are likely to be on a supported living payment, and, for instance, people who have retired and are now on a fixed income in their retirement. You can probably be pretty certain that the circumstances of those individuals are not going to change. If the Government is telling us that those individuals are unlikely to be subjected to this bill, why not put it into the bill? If it is ludicrous of us to even suggest it might happen to those individuals, why not put the safe clause into the legislation or just accept one of the Supplementary Order Papers that Labour has put forward. The fact that the Government has refused to do that but then tries to tell us that we are scaremongering says to me, why should we not raise that question? If the Government is so defensive about putting it into law, it is only right that we hold some suspicions over what its plans are in that regard.

Two larger elements of the bill have been debated at length. One is the idea that social housing be subject to income-related rents—absolutely. We are pleased that that is now available. We have some concerns about the pressure that that will put on social housing providers, but we will keep a close watch on that. In terms of the second element—the fact that the Ministry of Social Development will be providing the assessment, or overseeing the assessment regime—yes, you can certainly make an argument that that provides some efficiencies. But we will always maintain that unless you put in place the infrastructure and support around Work and Income staff to do that job—and anyone who has anything to do with their local Work and Income office will know the constraints that those staff are under—and, second, as long as the ministry has the kind of leadership that denies individuals the dignity they deserve when interfacing with those services, we will continue to be very, very watchful of the role that the ministry plays in conducting these assessments.

I just want to make a reasonably short contribution on this legislation. We do not support the Social Housing Reform (Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters Amendment) Bill and will continue to vote against it. But there are some very interesting issues that have been raised around this legislation and just around the housing debate in general.

We met today with a number of leaders of the church community, and I understand they met with other political parties, as well, over the day. Housing was an issue that was raised by them and by us—it is a major issue for the country—and it was noted that it was very good that housing is a major issue across the political spectrum and across the community, the community sector, ordinary families, and the private sector. There is at least some advantage in the fact that we are all discussing the issues around housing and the complexity of the housing problem and the housing crisis that we have. Most agree that there is a housing crisis. We might disagree on the extent. I certainly understand that National has said over and over that it does not believe there is a crisis, but it certainly knows that there is a deficit in housing and that there is a real issue for those who are homeless and those who are the most vulnerable. So we have at least made some progress in the last little while on developing some kind of common understanding that at least housing is critical.

Where we have not reached any real consensus at all is on what to do about it. Unfortunately, this legislation is a really clear example of the political divide, because the primary purpose of this legislation is to prevent more people from getting access to social housing. That is what the reviewable tenancy process does. It is primarily designed to move people out of the existing social housing stock and into the arms of other organisations, which are not being properly funded and cannot cope with the influx. It is really unfortunate, the housing legislation that we debate, when we all agree that there is a housing issue, we all agree that vulnerable families who are in urgent need of housing are not getting it, we all agree that there is a deficit of housing at the affordable end of the market, and we all understand—at least, I would imagine, if others have access to the facts—that homeownership amongst the middle class is also declining. This is all publicly available information. Yet the one piece of legislation that we are debating is legislation that will reduce the security of the most vulnerable families in the very difficult housing environments that they have. It is a real tragedy that that is what we are spending our time on.

The arguments for this legislation from the National members have been around the greatest need. There is the greatest need argument. There is also the market rents argument. We heard from Sam Lotu-Iiga about how social housing should be made available to those with the greatest need. You might agree with that as a general statement, but it depends on your definition of greatest need. If the intention is to squeeze more and more people out of social housing and for the Government to reduce its involvement in social housing, then the criteria for meeting this threshold of greatest need becomes tighter and tighter and tighter, so fewer and fewer people meet that threshold and have access. The words are all fine to use; the devil in these matters is always in the detail.

I think about a couple of cases that I have at the moment, which I am managing through my office in Dunedin. I mentioned in the second reading debate this case of a woman who has been working. She and her husband have been working very hard. They have two children, one of whom has a very severe disability. They take Child, Youth and Family kids, so they are fostering other children in order to assist those children and the State in taking care of children who are in State care. Her husband has a very severe fatal form of cancer and is no longer able to work. She has to care for her children and for her husband, and is no longer able to work. So their ability to access housing in the private market has now been completely constrained, and she does not meet the criteria for greatest need. She does not meet the criteria for greatest need. Sam Lotu-Iiga can stand up and say that this housing is available to those who have the greatest need. To her it is not. To her it is not, so she has to get intervention. She requires an MP to intervene on her behalf in order to try to get her further up the list so that, even if she does not meet the National Government’s criteria of greatest need, she at least has some chance of getting into social housing.

Now, of course, once this legislation passes, she may well get access to a State house, but she has no security of tenure. There is absolutely no way that she can be assured that she can raise her children and the children in State care whom she takes care of, and care for her husband towards the end of his life, with any sense of security. If, for example, her income changes slightly—perhaps she gets a part-time job because things are going well—then she could well be subject to a review and, therefore, to market rents.

One of the other parts of the detail, I guess, that the National Party members are failing to describe is this. They talk about how so many people who are renting State houses are paying market rents and say that this is a sign that these people are excessively wealthy and are not entitled, therefore, to any form of social assistance. Let us just remember that the market rents approach or calculation kicks in at about the level of New Zealand superannuation. For a single person that is about $350-odd a week, and for a married couple it is around $500 and a bit a week. At that point, when a married couple is earning a bit over $500 a week, they are subject to a market rent calculation by Housing New Zealand. They will not be entitled to an income-related rent subsidy. They will have to pay a market rent, according to Housing New Zealand, at that low-income threshold.

These families who are in desperate need, who are trying to find some stability in their lives, who are looking to social housing to provide that stability so they can get back on their feet a little bit—when they do start to get back on their feet, they are penalised for doing OK. They are penalised for earning a little bit of extra income. They are penalised for getting a part-time job. They are penalised for having some sense of security. They are penalised for doing well enough—perhaps they have recovered from a mental illness, for example.

Actually, I have another case like this. It is a woman who is living in a two-bedroom State house with three children, and who is desperate to move. She is desperate to move into a bigger State home in the neighbourhood in which she has built some strong support. There are State houses in her neighbourhood, two streets away from where she lives now, that are on the market. They are three-bedroom State homes, they are on the market, and they are being sold. She is desperate to get into a bigger home so she can better take care of her family.

She was told by Housing New Zealand that she did not qualify for this greatest need threshold because she does not have a mental illness. She is just managing to care for her children, settle herself in her community, and make sure her kids go to school. She is just managing to keep her head above water, and she is being punished for that because of the threshold of greatest need. If she was to go and get herself a part-time job in order to bring a little bit more income into her home so that she can take better care of her kids, she risks being subject to a market rent calculation that could mean that her rent rockets up and she would then be unable to afford to live in that State house. Not only that, she would also be subject to a reviewable tenancy by this Government that could see her lose her home.

This is the consequence of this legislation. These are the real cases, the real people whom this legislation will impose an enormous burden on. Those families who are just able to get by, who are doing as well as they can in the circumstances, who love their kids, who do everything they can to care for their kids, who are trying to find those little steps, those small steps, to get themselves into a better situation—at every point where they try to improve they are punished by this Government for doing so. This legislation, with its reviewable tenancies, does exactly that all over again. It is a tragic piece of legislation. It will not help these families at all. It will squeeze more and more families out of housing, and will drive poverty and drive child poverty. This Government really does not care about that at all. Thank you.

It is a pleasure to rise to take a short call on the third reading of the Social Housing Reform (Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters Amendment) Bill. I would like to congratulate the Minister of Housing on the work done on this social housing reform. Our social housing package is a key part of this National-led Government’s promise to deliver better public services to the people of New Zealand.

I was sitting here listening to the debate earlier, and I have to react to one speech where I think Moana Mackey actually said we should do what Labour did for housing. Well, let me say no, thank you. For 9 years Labour had the Treasury benches. I would like to compare the work that we are doing in this National-led Government with what Labour did in the 9 years that it was in Government. No, thank you, we will not be following what Labour did for housing.

I listened to a lot of examples that different members have quoted. I too have an example. Last Friday I visited a constituent in a house where there are 19 people living in a three-bedroom home. Some people are living in the garage. A lot of the teenage children are living on the couches in the living room. There is a brother and sister-in-law who have four children living in a single room that is slightly wider than my outstretched arms. They have three single beds. There was not a lot of room to move. They are desperate to find a house, but there is not one for them. They are on the waiting list. I wish I could actually help them.

Earlier, the Minister gave an example of a man in his electorate. When he got the housing help he probably did need it, but now he is still living in a Housing New Zealand home when he is earning a lot of money. He is able to afford a home, while there are people in my electorate who are living in a single room—a couple with four children. Each parent is sleeping on a single bed with one child each, and with a newborn baby who is less than 30 days old. That is a need. This bill is about helping people like that in the electorate that I am based in, Mt Albert, and getting them into a house because they are the people who are most in need. I commend this bill. This is a great bill. Thank you very much.

The Social Housing Reform (Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters Amendment) Bill is simply objectionable, and in some parts it is Draconian, in two fundamental ways. The first is its adopting of the policy of reviewable rentals based solely on the assessed ability of tenants to move into private accommodation, either rental or homeownership, when in the main population centres, especially Auckland and Christchurch, the cost of homes has exploded and the rents for rental properties, if they can be found, have rocketed out of control. The second way is by reducing the role and nature of Housing New Zealand and pushing rental housing responsibility on to community organisations, some of which clearly are not capable of fulfilling that role.

Not only are there very extensive powers of investigation of any tenant to see whether they are eligible for income-related housing but also several new clauses set up Housing New Zealand effectively as New Zealand’s housing police and authorise Housing New Zealand to set aside the Privacy Act. Under this bill Housing New Zealand may by written notice require information from any person concerning housing assessment reviews, the only exceptions being in cases of genuine privilege and financial information such as financial transactions. That still leaves a lot of information that any person must provide, so that anyone can give most information they have about a Housing New Zealand tenant, as though they are second-class citizens in that respect, without fear of infringing important human rights as set out in the Privacy Act.

This is typical of the Government’s attitude to Housing New Zealand tenants—second-class citizens. The offences are Draconian. They provide for imprisonment for up to 12 months or a fine not exceeding $5,000, or both. The only redeeming provisions in this Draconian part of the legislation are those relating to the code of conduct and to the role of the Privacy Commissioner, but these do not alter the fact that human rights are trampled by this bill. The Government’s whole approach is wrong, and the bill will have to be repealed when possible because it attacks some of the most vulnerable people in the community—those who cannot afford to buy a home in today’s market or cannot afford the spiralling rents in the private rental market, especially, of course, in Auckland and in Christchurch.

The basic problem is that people who are assessed as capable of obtaining private sector accommodation are in many, many cases not able to find alternative rental properties or, in fact, not able to pay exorbitant rents, in Christchurch or Auckland especially. I know from my personal experience in talking with people and seeing people who come to me in Christchurch that it is difficult to obtain alternative accommodation in Christchurch, that the rents are exorbitant, and that these people would have a real problem. National still has the gall to stand a candidate in the Christchurch East by-election while this obnoxious bill proceeds to enactment on a slender majority. Christchurch East will be the worst-affected electorate in this country by this thoughtless bill. As if the effects of the Canterbury earthquakes are not enough, this bill will be another blow for the many Housing New Zealand tenants in Christchurch, and in Christchurch East in particular, who are struggling to recover.

Rather than provide more rental housing, the Government seeks to suppress demand by moving people out of State houses if Housing New Zealand assesses that they are financially able to do so. This is not by itself a satisfactory reason, and there is no adequate reason in principle or policy for that to be the only or main criteria for a policy that will force people to move. Despite the Government’s claims that it will take a lenient approach, people will inevitably be nudged out of their homes—effectively bullied out of their homes—because the Government is unwilling to build more homes, and that is the real issue. This Government is, in fact, unwilling to meet the demand, and instead will artificially suppress demand, rather than meeting the housing needs of people who need it. There are good reasons for people, especially the elderly, to choose to remain in State house rentals, even if they are assessed as being able to move elsewhere when it is not necessarily the best option for them.

The constant threat of regular reviews will lead to significant social problems. Health, education, and personal security will suffer, and community well-being will suffer. All this stress, especially for elderly and other vulnerable people, cannot be done in the lenient way asserted by this Government. What is needed is a genuine social housing service—not just buildings but a service to customers, who will pay market rents when they can afford them or income-related rents when they cannot. Those needs should be matched with the housing best suited to them, not just shunted out of the State system into the hands of others who may or may not be best suited for the purpose.

The Government will transfer large sums of money to community housing organisations through subsidies to registered providers. These organisations will own the housing funded or gifted by the Government, and there will be no State asset in return. The provisions in this bill to deal with incompetent providers and with those that fail altogether are confused and inadequate—not nearly good enough to justify the application of such huge amounts of public money.

The most glaring omission is that the bill does not provide for local councils to be community providers at all, despite the Christchurch City Council, the council where I live, being the second-largest provider, after Housing New Zealand, and despite other councils such as those in Wellington, Auckland, and elsewhere having a long and well-proven record of excellence in social housing provision. The Government should actually be funding such councils with long-term, low-interest loans—and that is New Zealand First’s policy—so that they can provide elderly persons’ housing and public rental housing and also provide the many support services needed by a genuine housing service provider. As I have said, that is what is really needed here. And they can coordinate this with other council plans and services—things this Government simply does not understand.

This misguided bill actually proves that without any doubt. It is a bill with many risks: economic risks for the Government, social risks for our housing-stressed communities, and major risks for the health and well-being of thousands of Kiwis who are most at risk from a “do not care” attitude of an incompetent Government. This bill should not be enacted, for all of those reasons. It is, quite simply, misconceived. It does not build on the experience of the past; it sails out into an uncertain future with many risks—far too many risks—for this bill to be viable. This is an obnoxious bill, it is a bad piece of legislation, and it should simply not be enacted.

I would like to stand to congratulate the Minister of Housing, Nick Smith, on introducing a number of aspects in this piece of legislation, the Social Housing Reform (Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters Amendment) Bill, that will see the improvement of the operation of the social housing and affordable housing sector right across New Zealand, involving both the Government and community housing providers.

But there are two particular aspects that I would like to congratulate the Minister on. First of all, those who are genuinely in need will be helped by the State and these community housing providers during the duration of their need. That means that when households become self-sufficient, earning over $100,000, or when their state of health is such that they can move to the private sector, they are able to move on and open up the State house for someone else who is in line and needing a State house. Gone are the days when someone can sit in a State house for 30 or 40 years when their incomes have improved, the family has left home, and they can easily rent privately or, in fact, purchase their own home. We see that as part of a mutual obligation.

It is very interesting that Dr Nick Smith will oversee this year the last State house in New Zealand to be insulated that can be insulated. Although the Labour Party in 9 years in Government talked a lot, I believe, about how it supported State housing and State house tenants, it left tens of thousands of State houses uninsulated. That is quite unbelievable, is it not, that those members harp on about State housing and their love for the tenants, but Labour could not do something as simple as insulating a house. The cost is $3,000 or $4,000—not a lot—per house, but it was not prepared to do that. Nick Smith will see every State house in New Zealand insulated that can be insulated.

The mutual obligation there is, of course, that he will stand firmly against those few State house tenants involved in gangs and cooking P in the kitchen. He will stand against those tenants. He will say: “You can’t beat up the neighbours. You can’t disturb the neighbours. You can’t trade in illegal goods inside your State house.” So there is a big tidy-up of the sector, and I must say that the large majority of State house tenants are grateful for those two things: first of all, that their houses are being insulated after all those years of living in the cold under the Labour Government, and, secondly, that those neighbours who do stir up trouble, those gangs that do cook P and that run up and down the streets beating up their neighbours, are being brought under control by Housing New Zealand. So I congratulate Nick Smith on the new reviewable tenancies, on upgrading those State houses, and on bringing those mutual obligations forward.

Secondly, I would like to congratulate the Minister, in supporting this bill, on the beginning of bringing in the community housing sector with some seriousness; forging the relationship, if you like, between Government and iwi and community housing organisations; and making sure that community housing organisations, their expertise, their assets, their cash, and their tenants are brought together with Housing New Zealand’s assets, Housing New Zealand’s expertise, and Housing New Zealand’s tenants. So it is about forging that relationship.

Labour members talked a lot about that, but never passed income-related rents for the community housing sector in 9 years. Of course, now that we are doing that—we are funding the community housing sector with income-related rents funding—according to the Labour members it is not enough. Of course, zero was not enough when they were in Government for 9 years, and I am delighted that Nick Smith is actually walking the Labour members’ talking. He is doing everything they waxed lyrical about for 9 years. He is going ahead and doing it. The Labour members have no solutions. They sat on their hands for 9 years. I congratulate Dr Nick Smith on all that he is doing in Nelson and right across New Zealand.

Musical chairs—it was a game that was fun, was not it, at birthday parties when we were growing up? That idea that you put a bunch of chairs out there, the music started, and when the music stopped, there was one less chair than there were party-goers, so someone dipped out. Then another chair was taken away, the music would start again, and on it would go. That is what this Government is doing with social housing. It is taking the chair away and making sure that there is less and less provision for higher and higher demand and need. That is what the Labour Party finds so offensive about this bill, the Social Housing Reform (Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters Amendment) Bill.

It does not even aim to address the stripping out of capital funding that this Government has undertaken with Housing New Zealand. I think that through the course of the debate that we heard earlier, the Minister of Housing did not even refute the facts that the Salvation Army put before this country just last week. The facts were that the National-led Government has provided the Housing New Zealand Corporation with only $129 million in capital contributions in its first 3 years, and yet it required $271 million in dividends. That is a result of a net $142 million withdrawal of funding from the organisation. It is not just a withdrawal of funds; it is a withdrawal from the building of State houses and the replenishment and the increasing of the stock of social housing in this country.

Until the Government gets to grips with that fact, then Sam Lotu-Iiga’s young pregnant woman living in the garage has not got a hope. She is not going to actually get a decent roof over the head of her young 2-year-old, whom he described, never mind the forthcoming baby, because that Government is not doing anything to add to the social housing stock. So there was all the weeping and wailing, but although I am sure it was genuine—because I am sure that when that woman dragged Sam Lotu-Iiga into that garage to see that situation, he genuinely felt horror at what he saw—this is not the solution. This is not the solution.

If there are people who have high incomes, who should no longer be in State houses, and who have other options to go to, then why is the Government not doing that good old-fashioned thing of actually getting the Housing New Zealand staff to negotiate with them, talk to them, and find something that is more suitable for their needs? That is what used to happen under Labour. That is back in the day, though, when you could actually talk to a real person from Housing New Zealand. That is back in the day before the Minister of Housing, who introduced this bill into the House, took the face of Housing New Zealand away and turned it into an 0800 number. Actually, that might have been from the member who has just resumed his seat, Phil Heatley. I am quite unfairly lambasting the current Minister for this. But this Government has now hidden Housing New Zealand behind a wall of phone banks. The 0800 number, which not only any average citizen cannot get through to and get an answer from, but I know that members opposite will be having the same problem as well, which is that even MPs’ offices cannot get an answer from the 0800 number of Housing New Zealand.

💬 Hon Judith Collins: The electorate MPs can.

Oh well, Judith Collins says that electorate MPs can. Well, she is wrong—she is absolutely wrong about that. Electorate MPs and list MPs and councillors and New Zealanders are actually finding that their phone calls are not getting answered, and they are not able to get through to the person with the answer that they need. If Judith Collins does not accept that that is the reality, then she is just demonstrating over and over again how out of touch she is, and the entire National Government is—

💬 Hon Judith Collins: Clearly out of touch!

—with what is going on. Well, those members are out of touch, and I think that that demonstrates it. Judith Collins thinks that the 0800 number is working perfectly well.

💬 Hon Judith Collins: Well, it is.

“It is.”, she says. Well, can all those New Zealanders who are listening to this debate please email Judith.Collins@parliament.govt.nz and tell her about the many occasions on which they have not got satisfaction from using the 0800 number, because she does not seem to know. She is completely out of touch with it. So the Government has hidden the Housing New Zealand that used to engage with tenants—[Interruption] Oh look, Judith Collins is showing out of touch she is all over again. According to her, Judith.Collins@parliament.govt.nz, everything is tickety-boo with Housing New Zealand. I would just like to ask every New Zealander who has ever had a problem with Housing New Zealand to email her now. Or she is actually quite active on Twitter, so get on Twitter and tell her your problems. I think it is @JudithCollins, is it? Is that the Twitter—

💬 Hon Maryan Street: That’ll do.

That will do.

💬 Hon Maryan Street: Just look for it.

Just look for it—look for the nastiest comments you can get on Twitter, and you will get on to that member’s Twitter feed. Just get on to Twitter right now, New Zealanders, and give Judith Collins all of your very real-life experiences of dealing with Housing New Zealand because it seems that she actually needs to hear them right now. That Minister is completely out of touch. She thinks that everything is sorted with housing in New Zealand. She does not get it, and it is like the Government’s denial of the housing crisis. Have we ever heard that? Its absolute denial that there is a housing crisis in New Zealand.

So, again, any New Zealander who is finding it tough to buy a home or to rent a home, contact Judith.Collins@parliament.govt.nz, or get on Twitter—Twitter will do just as well. I think she really does need to know exactly what is going on in the housing market, because those members do not seem to get it that there is a housing crisis.

But back to this bill. This bill does not actually address the needs that New Zealanders have—it certainly does not address the needs that New Zealanders have. In fact, what it does is it makes the tenancies of some of the most vulnerable in our society so much less secure. What more fundamental social need is there in this country than the right of people to have a decent roof over their heads? What is more fundamental than the right of children to know that they are going to be able to go to their neighbourhood school because they are not going to be moved on unfairly by a faceless, nameless, bureaucrat in Housing New Zealand, who has not even got the decency to just go and have a conversation, go and actually have a negotiation, or go and talk with people about their options. Housing New Zealand officials are no longer going to need to do that because this Government wants to take the lazy approach of actually legislating people’s rights away instead. It is actually legislating security of tenancy away from these people and just saying that, yes, they are the most vulnerable in our society, but, really, it is not going to take the time—

I am sorry to interrupt the honourable member.

Debate interrupted.

Sitting suspended from 10 p.m. to 9.a.m. (Wednesday)