Residential Tenancies (Healthy Homes Standards) Amendment Bill

I move, That the Residential Tenancies (Healthy Homes Standards) Amendment Bill be now read a second time.

In this second reading speech, I will just give a relatively quick call. A number of questions have been raised by members in this House, many of them that need to be addressed, but I will address those in the committee of the whole House stage.

Sometimes, this House does have to be pragmatic. Sometimes, this House does have to look at a compliance issue and say, “Are there issues beyond the control of individuals that mean that we risk having laws that put people in the position of breaking the law?”

Now, we’d all like to see all our houses compliant. I don’t think there is anybody who is voting in favour of this extension that wants to see houses non-compliant, and people’s homes non-compliant with this. But what we do have to do with our lawmaking is make sure we are not setting up situations where we are knowingly putting people in the position of breaking the law.

Having warm, safe, and dry homes for people is at the core of what we as a Labour Government put at the heart of our wellbeing. We know that from warm, dry, and safe houses, all the other wellbeings flow—whether that be community connectedness, whether that be employment, whether that be health, all the other things that are absolutely at the core of our mission.

But we also know that we have had severe constraints on our supply chains and our ability to access people’s homes since the period when these regulations were put into place in 2019. There are still many tenants, particularly in the community housing sector and for Kāinga Ora, who have some reticence about tradespeople entering their home. So it may not be just for the ability to actually access the home that they cannot apply. As a landlord of some of the most vulnerable people in this country, we need to work through those issues, with some sensitivity. There are still a number of people who are quite frightened, particularly elderly people, about strangers who they do not know entering their home and risk being exposed to COVID-19. That is not something that I am willing to force on our tenants when we have options in front of us.

Before we get too excited that this means that all of our homes are not warm, dry, and safe, I think we just need to pause, reflect, and think about what we have achieved. When we passed these regulations in 2019, we did not have a requirement for any homes to be compliant. We now, in our Kāinga Ora stock, have 68 percent of our homes fully compliant, with the remainder—just to let Mr Bishop know how we get to the 84 percent—that takes us to the 84 percent currently have the work under way. They’re not in planning. They’re not in the pipeline. There are tradespeople in those homes getting those homes up to standard now. That is a vast improvement if we think, during a period where we faced a global pandemic, that we have been able to achieve those kind of levels.

I want to congratulate the private landlords that have been able to make gains. But to say that private landlords have outstripped Kāinga Ora simply isn’t true. If you have a look at the regulatory impact statement, you’ll actually see the reverse of those numbers—that, actually, it’s around 15 percent, on that Kantar survey, of private landlords that were compliant, with 70 percent who had made moves to become compliant but were not fully compliant. But, I think, if we look at the numbers in a really pragmatic way, what we can see is, probably, 85 percent of the targets we set, before a global pandemic affected supply chains and labour markets, is about the capacity of the market at the moment.

That is why we are making these changes. They are adding a year to everybody and to give everyone time for them to come up to standard. But of course it is our wish that people do this as quickly as they can.

The question is that the motion be agreed to.

Thank you very—

💬 David Seymour: Point of order, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, you ruled in the last reading that once you had said “The question is that the motion be agreed to.”, no speech could begin. Now, you and I both know, of course, that Speaker’s ruling 65/5 says that, actually, until you finish those words, somebody can seek a call. And I just wonder if you could explain for the benefit of the people watching at home which set of rules you are enforcing tonight. Is it the ones in the book or the ones you made up?

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Thank you to the member. I will not have a reflection on my ruling. The member will stand, withdraw, and apologise.

💬 David Seymour: Ha, ha! I withdraw and apologise. Point of Order, Madam Speaker. We would still like you to answer the question.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Yeah, well, David Seymour, I’m just going to warn you that I’m trying to be very tolerant. It’s getting on. We only have two hours and 10 minutes to go this evening, so we’ve still got a wee way to go. I am now commencing the second reading—or the House is commencing the second reading of this bill. It is my—

💬 David Seymour: Under which rules?

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): The member will not interrupt while I am ruling. I am now going to proceed on the basis of an orderly second reading, which indicates that I will call Chris Bishop, which I now do.

Thank you very much, Madam Speaker. Bit of fun and games at close to five to 10 on a Wednesday night under urgency. It’s the cabin fever that sets in at this time of year with just two weeks—

💬 Hon Dr Megan Woods: It’s only Wednesday.

What’s that?

💬 Hon Dr Megan Woods: It’s only Wednesday.

Yeah, I know. We’ve still got a long way—what did I say? Thursday? OK, I meant Wednesday. Wishful thinking! We’ve still got a long way to go. I think we’re on bill three of the 24 in the urgency motion. I could be slightly wrong on that, but we could still be here till Friday.

So this is an embarrassing bill for the Government to have to bring through the Parliament, and we’re going to help the Government out by expediting its passage through the Parliament. But let’s be under no illusions that this should be a source of embarrassment for the Government, because this bill could have come into the Parliament at any time in the last six to nine months. Currently, the latest figures we’ve got at 30 September—so 1 October; round it up—around two-thirds of Kāinga Ora tenancies are compliant with the healthy home standard. We’ve still got 23,000 or 20-odd thousand still to go. So at any stage in the last six to nine or maybe 12 months, the Government could have come down to Parliament and said, “Look, COVID’s been a problem. We’re not going to make it or it’s highly unlikely we’re going to make it. We need more time. And in the interests of fairness, we’re going to give everyone more time—the CHP sector. We’re going to give Kāinga Ora more time, and we’re going to give the private sector landlords more time.” And I think a lot of people would have welcomed that and said, “OK, fair enough. COVID’s been a tricky beast for everybody to deal with.”

And I take the Minister’s point around some of our more elderly and vulnerable people who don’t like having people who they don’t know in their homes. And many MPs in this Parliament who have dealt with Kāinga Ora residents in their electorates or areas they look after will be familiar with that issue. And I acknowledge that that is a real problem, and there is a degree of sensitivity and compassion that’s required there. And oftentimes it is the job of the MP to work through that with local tenants.

So if the Government had turned up six to nine months ago and said, “We’ve got a bit of an issue here. Look, let’s just put a bill into the House to give a bit of certainty and extend that time frame.”, I think many people would have welcomed that. But they didn’t do that. Instead, we’ve spent our time in the Parliament dealing with all sorts of other issues—many of them rinky-dink issues, not so important. And instead, here we are at the fag-end of the year, coming towards Christmas, on a Wednesday night, looking at an extension for every—

Brooke van Velden: It’s November. I’ve never heard that phrase.

💬 David Seymour: What sense of the word was the member using?

We’re right at the end of November. We’re in the third to last week of the sitting period for the year.

💬 David Seymour: Is that the definition?

Yeah, that’s right. Yeah, absolutely. We’re at the tail end of the year, and instead we have the Parliament put into urgency for the Government to embarrassingly extend the time frame.

And we know why we’re here. The Government can sort of talk about extra flexibility and all the rest of it, but we know why we’re here. We’re here because Kāinga Ora has failed in its task and its obligations. And as Chlöe Swarbrick actually said in her contribution that I listened to as I ducked out of the House—but I heard her dulcet tones ringing through the loud speaker system here in the Parliament. As Chlöe Swarbrick said, these regulations were passed in 2019 and here we are in 2022 under the current track before this bill makes its way into law later on tonight or maybe tomorrow morning. As Chlöe Swarbrick said, landlords have got till 1 July 2023, and we’re now getting the extension to 2024. But it’s a long way through and a long way down the line already. And, of course, COVID’s only turned up in 2020.

This is embarrassing because Kāinga Ora has simply failed to fulfil its obligations. And the poor old private sector landlords who have done the right thing in the last few years, who have actually moved heaven and earth to comply with the regulations, and gone out and done what they need to do. Many of them are under quite significant financial pressure because of the Government’s war on landlords, and the extension of the brightline test and the removal of interest deductibility has put enormous pressure on landlords. And they’ve gone and done the right thing. So here we have this situation where the double standards apply—the double standard where most private landlords have done the right thing, moved heaven and earth, and have complied with the regulations. But the Government landlord, the monopoly or near-monopolistic provider of Kāinga Ora, has acted like almost all monopolies do all the time, which is badly.

And that’s the situation we have. And the basket case that is Kāinga Ora has failed to fulfil its obligations under the law, and so the Government’s just going to give them a leave pass. So the Government’s response is not anything other than just a leave pass by dint of a piece of legislation that they’re going to ram through all stages. But we’re a helpful Opposition. We always try and do the right thing. We try and facilitate where we need to, and I see a couple of members with a wry smile over there—the member for Upper Harbour and the member for Taieri, smiling away. But they know, because they’ve been on committees with me. They know that we’re a constructive Opposition. We’re sensible, we try and do the right thing, and we’re happy to help. And I see Karen Chhour from the ACT Party is smiling, and I know she agrees with me, as the members opposite do.

💬 Hon Scott Simpson: She sure does.

That’s right. Thank you very much, Scott Simpson. And so we’re prepared to help facilitate this because we want to be sensible and constructive. But we note in passing the double standard, because it is a double standard. And the Government has turned up here and said, “You know, we’re going to do it for everybody.” But we know why they’re doing it. They’re doing it because Kāinga Ora has failed to fulfil its obligations. And so instead, we have this fig leaf, this facade, this front, where it applies for everybody, but the real target is KO, Kāinga Ora, and I think everybody in the House knows that, and, certainly, the people out there watching know it. And so that is why we are here.

So we’re going to facilitate it. We welcome it. It will be welcomed by some of the private sector landlords. It certainly will be welcomed by the thousands of extra Kāinga Ora staff who have been added to the bureaucracy in the last five years. No doubt they will enjoy that extra time. So we will support this bill, but let’s be under no illusion about why we are here. And people will see the double standards for what they are. Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker—Acting Assistant Speaker.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Barbara Kuriger): Thank you, Mr Bishop. I call Vanushi Walters.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Mr Bishop talks about an embarrassment, but I’ll tell you what’s an embarrassment is the massive sell-off of State homes by the Opposition when they were in Government. That is the embarrassment and that is the double standard. But given that the National Party Opposition are supporting the bill today, I’ll stop my critique there, and I will just commend the Minister of Housing on her pragmatism in bringing forward this important bill, and I know the Minister considered other time lines as well and gave significant thought to the time that would be required to get us to full compliance. This is a Minister who has been working very hard to also ensure that Kāinga Ora has supply agreements in place, and I know that there will be plenty of work done to ensure that they meet that new time line. I commend this bill to the House.

E te Māngai, tēnā koe. Tēnā koutou e te Whare. Statistics New Zealand data tells us that renters are more likely to pay more of their income for their housing, but, more than that, they are more likely to live in worse, mouldier, and less stable homes. I’d like to draw the House’s attention and the public’s attention, actually, to that, given that we’re going from zero to a hundred with this legislation being announced yesterday and it’s going to be passed within 48 hours without the opportunity for us to go through scrutiny at the select committee stage or to grill officials or otherwise. So, again, I’ll reiterate that we’re really looking forward to the committee of the whole House stage.

But there is a really peculiar set of rationale outlined in the many papers that have been tabled and released, and I’d like to commend the Minister for that at the very least and for tabling and releasing, particularly, the Cabinet papers and the minutes that led to this decision. But there’s a really peculiar set of rationale outlined in those papers that I want to draw the House’s attention to. Now, this won’t be exhaustive because, obviously, as I’ve just stated, we’ve been provided with less than 24 hours to kind of—or, rather, 36 hours at this point in time—go through these papers and to present these arguments and to debate this in the House, which, obviously, is going incredibly quickly, given that the Opposition is not particularly willing to put up much of a fight.

Firstly, the regulatory impact statement identifies, as I said in my first reading speech, that renters and that tenants, and particularly our most vulnerable tenants, are going to be the most impacted by the passage of this legislation, but it also states in that regulatory impact statement that the tenants, the most vulnerable tenants in this country—who are most likely to be impacted by this legislation—are precisely the group that were not consulted with. The Government consulted instead with a select group that it chose of property managers, landlords, and, of course—as many have already canvassed—Kāinga Ora.

Secondly, the Government says that in—or, rather, it’s outlined in this regulatory impact statement. Fascinatingly, because I didn’t know about this, it says that “The Government has an ongoing educational and informational programme to help landlords understand how the healthy homes standards can help maintain the value of their investment and retain tenants. These programmes may help reduce the frustration that a compliant landlord might feel.” I’m not sure how to interpret that as some kind of sell for what is being rushed through the House this evening—the fact that the Government has an educational programme to educate landlords about their responsibility to provide the human right of adequate housing to their tenants.

Thirdly, we have it, as outlined in this regulatory impact statement, that it’s believed that landlords need prompt relief—landlords need prompt relief—as they are already having to comply with their healthy homes standards obligations when tenancies start or are renewed. If we want to talk about the people that need relief, again, I think it’s really worthwhile that we go back to the core constituency, the core group of New Zealanders: the 1.5 million New Zealanders who live in rental properties, who are identified in the exact same regulatory impact statement as being primarily affected and disproportionately affected by this legislation that we’re passing through tonight, and who, again, the Government consciously chose not to consult with, given that it proactively went out and chose those groups to consult with. It is those tenants who are disproportionately living in overly expensive, more mouldy, and less stable housing who are the ones that need immediate relief.

I also find it really fascinating, again—this is on page 4 of the regulatory impact statement for those who are following along at home—where when you go through the assumptions regarding the issues that are being raised, it states—and I quote—“The key assumption underpinning our understanding of the problem is that the information provided to HUD by stakeholders is accurate and representative of the rental market for both private landlords and public housing providers.” To put that in plain English: effectively, what we have here is rationale that is entirely self-referential. The problem that this legislation is seeking to resolve is one that the Government consulted a select group on to tell them their problems, and then it is rationalising on the basis of what that select group said. Again, this is not the group that the regulatory impact statement has identified as being primarily impacted by this legislation, with that being the 1.5 million renters in this country who disproportionately live in worse homes than those who own their homes.

Fifthly, the Government is now actually trumpeting, as you go through this regulatory impact statement and also through the Cabinet paper, that they are speeding up the process of compliance, particularly with Kāinga Ora, which, of course, the Opposition has spent most of their time going through, and with good reason because the State should be leading by example. The fact that we are seeing that the Government is lagging on this and on updating—particularly with the economies of scale that it has at its disposal to purchase and to upgrade these properties—is, frankly, abysmal. In this report, it’s trumpeting that we’ve gone from upgrading and compliance of around 180 homes per week in June 2021, to 600 to 700 per week now.

Again, I have to ask the question. We have known for years that healthy homes standards are needed to be enforced by next year, but we’ve only started to see the Government start to ramp this programme up at the very tail end of things. So it prompts the question of why are we waiting until now, and—as I believe others have already also said in earlier speeches in the first reading of this bill—it is, in fact, the case that many landlords have actually sometimes got themselves in debt to do this stuff early.

We are also hearing, as reflected in the regulatory impact statement again—which I’ll continually refer to, because it is the Government’s rationale for this legislation being rushed under urgency tonight—that the Government has no idea what actually happens if we reach the compliance deadline. Now, this is a really important one for us to dig into, because what we have at paragraph 14 of the regulatory impact statement—and I think I’ll quote this for those who are interested in the House and are engaging in actual robust debate about this—is that “Currently, where private landlords have not complied with their deadline and this is brought to the regulator’s attention, the regulator will seek information to establish what efforts the landlord has taken to comply to help inform the appropriate response. Landlords are encouraged to keep records of the steps they have taken to comply in case this is sought by the regulator.” Effectively, the compliance deadline is kind of a wet bus ticket slap anyway. The Government has no idea what happens if we got to the deadline already in the legislation.

We also have, fascinatingly, a rationale in here about the fact that “In the absence of Government intervention to extend the compliance date, landlords and tenants may seek resolution through the Tenancy Tribunal. This could strain the limited time and resources of the Tenancy Tribunal.” Once again, this is a rationale for a warrant of fitness that front-loads these issues with the healthy homes standards, which currently are, effectively, voluntary, based on the fact that the Government is not collecting data on them, and, again, it continues to rely particularly on tenants for enforcement and taking them through to the Tenancy Tribunal.

The other fascinating part of this, when you get down to paragraph 19, is that it says here—and I quote—“The Tenancy Tribunal can only order someone to pay exemplary damages when they have committed an unlawful act intentionally, so a landlord who has attempted to comply would not receive an exemplary damages order.” All of that—we’re going through all of this—to extend the deadline for healthy homes standards compliance when it says in black and white in the regulatory impact statement that it is a wet bus ticket slap on the wrist for non-compliance anyway, and the very least that the Tenancy Tribunal has power to do is to simply order that a nominal charge be paid.

So I have to ask, what’s the point? The healthy homes standards—absolutely. They’re an improvement on what the status quo was prior to them being implemented. But none the less, we still have 1.5 million renters in this country who are left to fend, effectively, for themselves with these, effectively, voluntary healthy homes standards.

I just finally want to point out that there’s something called the Healthy Homes Initiative, which is run by the Ministry of Health, and it is not to be confused with the healthy homes standards. But there is some overlap, particularly because the Ministry of Health is identifying homes that are explicitly unhealthy because people are presenting in our hospitals with illnesses created by living in those unhealthy homes. And guess what? Over the last nine years, 25,000 homes have been identified as unhealthy for people to live in, but only 41—41—of those homes were ever investigated by Tenancy Services. That is a strike rate of 0.16 percent. If you speak to tenants—and many experts and researchers have—in these homes identified by the Healthy Homes Initiative, they are terrified of the power imbalance in this country, which this legislation continues to entrench.

Thank you very much, Madam Speaker. I’m tempted to suggest to the Parliament that we just need a moment to take a breath after what were quite a lot of words firing out there from the previous speaker. One of the problems we have with the Greens—and we support this bill—is that they always believe that they and bigger government can solve every problem there is; there’s no space for the private sector. One of the reasons we’re supporting this bill tonight is because actually there is a role for the private sector along with a number of regulations as well.

Chlöe Swarbrick: You just want to regulate women’s bodies. And the gays.

The member Chloe Swarbrick still hasn’t taken a breath, but, you know, evidence is always on her side. She never has an ability to accept that there’s other points of view.

As we say, we support this bill. It’s something that we raised when the bill—sorry, the now Act—was going through Parliament a while back: that the time that was given was not going to be enough. And this side of the House had also pointed out at the time the inconsistency in that Housing New Zealand or Kāinga Ora was given different time zones. The fact that this is moving forward is positive. Certainly my observation in my own electorate is that most private landlords are moving relatively swiftly to implement what is required, and I think that’s appropriate. As I said at the start, we don’t want larger and bigger government. I’ve said before in this House that being a landlord is not a social service at the whim of the Greens and others. We want to actually work with—

Chlöe Swarbrick: Is housing a human right?

Someone is crying out, “Is housing a human right?” One of the things that she has to understand is, yes, home or shelter is a human right. How that manifests becomes slightly different—OK? That’s actually a really a subtle difference. The problem with the Greens is that it’s not just wanting shelter and a home; they have to specify an absolute high, high level of what they deem to be appropriate.

Chlöe Swarbrick: No, that’s you mate. You don’t want housing in your electorate.

I’m not your mate, because I’m on this side of the House and you’re confused on whether you’re in Opposition or in Government. Fundamentally, we’re not here to give a lesson to the Green Party in human rights or housing. We just want to note that we support the bill and thank the Minister for bringing it to the House.

Thank you. Look, I’m going to take Emily Henderson, but before we start, I realise we’re a little bit out of order. It’s past 10 o’clock and everyone’s got themselves a little bit shuffled around, but I am counting.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. As the MP for Whangārei, where we have some of the most deprived and ramshackle housing in the country, I am hugely aware of the importance of the healthy homes standards, hugely in favour of the work being done by this Government, and hugely admiring of both Kāinga Ora and our private providers, who are both managing, neck and neck, to get through this. But pragmatism is necessary in order to reach some sort of appropriate achievements. We need pragmatism. This bill is going to give it to us in an environment where COVID has prevented people getting things done on time. I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Good things come to those who wait, and what a debate tonight. I really hoped to follow my friend and colleague Chlöe Swarbrick. You know, despite being from fairly different perspectives, I think we are friends; I hope Chloe would say that. I hoped to follow her because I thought her speech was so interesting. If you cast your mind back to what Chlöe Swarbrick said, she said two things: one is that housing is a human right. I think that’s very interesting, and I’ll come back to that. Then she pointed out that we are tonight extending the deadline for healthy homes compliance, and there’s going to be a new date after which, in theory, all houses, whether they’re the Government’s houses or the private sector landlords’ houses, must meet the healthy homes standard. You put those two things together—housing is a human right, and there’s a certain date where they must reach the standard—and it leads to the question of what happens if a house reaches the date and it doesn’t meet the standard? This is a really difficult thing for the Chlöe Swarbricks of the world, because does she want that house to be emptied out? Would she rather have a person kicked out of a house and be homeless than live in a house that does not meet the healthy homes standard?

Now, I’ll give it to Chlöe Swarbrick and the Greens—no matter how illogical, they hold their beliefs passionately. The Labour Party, they are a bit more like National; they are very pragmatic. When it comes down to it, there’s always an escape hatch, and, as Chlöe Swarbrick pointed out actually, what happens when you get to the end of the road and you meet the 1 July 2024 or 2025 deadline? Well, you can be fined, the tribunal can seek information about what you’re going to do, but there’s no real consequence, because no sane person would actually say they wanted to kick someone out of a house and make them homeless instead of having them in a home that hadn’t passed the healthy homes standard.

Once you’ve worked through that, it tells you something interesting about this whole healthy homes policy. You see, the thought is that somehow it’s going to be possible that passing a law will actually improve the quality of housing. The problem is that that just could not be. All it could do is force people to take resources away from some things they were going to spend money on and put more of it into housing. You see, people already have the option of buying or renting a nicer house, but often people don’t, because they can’t afford it or they would rather spend their money on other things, such as food, or education for their children, or clothing, or entertainment, or whatever it is that they want. What the healthy homes standard really does is forces people to take money that they’ve chosen not to spend on healthy homes and spend it on housing of a certain standard. That’s all it does—it forces people to take money away from other things and put it into something that the Government thinks they would be better to do. It doesn’t actually make people better off. In fact, it makes them slightly worse off, because they have to spend money on what was their second-best choice. If they had already decided to live in a house that met that standard, then this law would make no difference.

The problem with this law is that it is, effectively, the same as saying, “We would rather people had no home than live in a home that breached the healthy homes standard.” But as Chlöe Swarbrick pointed out, that’s not actually what the law does, and it cannot do. So why do we have this law? It’s a very good example of the kind of thing that Governments and political parties—especially over on the left, but sometimes on the right, of the blue variety—do all the time. You see, the reason they passed the law is not because it will leave people better off. We’ve shown that this law can’t leave people better off, because you’re not actually going to kick people out. What it does show is that it will reward politicians because they’re seen to do the right thing. They hope that nobody is looking closely enough to check whether it’s actually delivered. If people did look a little closer, they would see a law that hasn’t been met on time, that has to be extended tonight, and that, actually, if people don’t comply, there are no consequences, because if there were, people would end up being made homeless instead of living in a house that hadn’t met the standard.

Then if they look a little bit more closely, what they see is that all this law has done is force people to spend more of their scarce income on housing than they would otherwise choose to. It says, “The Government knows how to use your household budget better than you do.”, as if somehow the Government has greater knowledge. That’s all it is. But of course, none of those things matter, because so long as the Labour Party can get up and say, “We’ve done something to deliver a better level of housing to people.”, then that might be enough to get them re-elected and the whole process continues on, but people are all the poorer.

It all turns into a good example of what Chlöe Swarbrick was talking about earlier. You remember, she had two ideas. One is that you don’t actually get kicked out of your house—of course you don’t. But the second was that Chlöe Swarbrick said that you have a right to housing. Well, the interesting thing about a right is that you can only have a right if somebody else has a duty that corresponds to that right—a duty to actually deliver. If you have a right with no duty, then actually you don’t have any right.

The people on the Labour benches, they’re exasperated, because they try not to think this way, otherwise it hurts their wee minds, but it’s true. When they say that there’s a right to housing, what they’re really saying is that somebody else has a duty to provide it for you. If it was just a right that you provided your own housing, that wouldn’t be any kind of right at all; it’s only a right because you expect somebody else to do it for you.

The great difficulty, as we’ve seen already with Chlöe Swarbrick’s speech, is that, actually, you can’t force somebody to get a home up to standard, and if they fail to do it, your basic choices are either to kick someone out and have them homeless or continue to live in the same house. You can’t enforce the duty of getting the house up to the healthy homes standard. The whole thing is a nonsense. It is a PR game. It is spin, designed to allow the Labour Party to tell voters that it has lived up to their expectations, to their feelings. But once you analyse how it actually works, you see that, at best, all it is going to do is re-prioritise some people’s household budgets to pay higher rent than they had already chosen to pay.

It’s nice to have these debates sometimes. It’s nice to have my old mate Chlöe Swarbrick here, because sometimes we can actually learn a little bit about Parliament, about politics, and how policy actually works. I particularly look forward, now, to what I think is about to happen, that somebody from the Labour Party is going to jump up in exasperation, with lots of “Tut, tut, tut! How could you be so stupid? Don’t you know everything that I know?” attitude and try and prove me wrong. The people at home will be able to figure it out for themselves. All they have to ask themselves is have these people from the Labour Party shown how anyone can have a right to something without forcing someone else to deliver on the duty of giving it to them? And is it possible that a healthy homes standard can make you better off, if you already had the option of buying a better home, but either didn’t have the money or had chosen to spend it differently? And what actually happens when a house doesn’t meet the deadline? Do you move out and be homeless, or do you keep living in the house, because you have no other way of delivering? Thank you, Madam Speaker.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. In reply to my colleague over the other side of the House: I spent years monitoring child health, and seeing thousands and thousands of sick children coming into hospital with housing-related conditions. I spent years advocating for healthy homes standards, and it was amazing that within months of us coming into Government, the Healthy Homes Guarantee Act passed into law. It’s one of the things that I’m most proud of. And so it’s amazing also to see the progress that’s been made, with about 80 percent of private rentals now either meeting the standards or work under way, and similarly with Kāinga Ora homes. So it’s amazing to see the progress, but we can’t also forget the impact that COVID’s had on supply chain disruptions, workforce shortages, problems getting heat pumps coming into the country, and so this bill is a pragmatic solution, but it also ensures that houses are compliant by 1 July 2025. I commend it to the House.

Penny Simmonds; this a split call—five minutes.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. And Madam Speaker, in this, my first call when you’ve been in the Chair, can I pass on my congratulations to you on that.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Barbara Kuriger): Thank you.

I’ll take a very short call on this, much as it galls me to be supporting Labour giving themselves a “get out of jail free” card, which is exactly what this bill is, it does however extend that grace period for private landlords and therefore we should support that. But I’m sure landlords are very aware that it is only happening because Labour couldn’t get their own house in order. So on that basis, we support it. Thank you very much, Madam Speaker.

Excuse me, is the Māori Party going to take a call?

💬 Debbie Ngarewa-Packer: I’m not sure if my colleague is online.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Barbara Kuriger): No, he’s not.

I’ll just take a short call on this matter. Yes, so this is something I’m extremely proud that the Labour Government has done. I too have had discussions with people who are in a medical profession who told me that this is where we can get the best bang for buck. If we actually make our houses warm and dry, we will actually save real lives. It was actually Dr David Galler who was talking to me about this, and he was saying that we had a system which had actually turned many of our hospitals into places where we dealt with chronic disease instead of trauma, and that is a great tragedy. This is a pragmatic piece of legislation, and this is the kind of Government that this country needs because it will be pragmatic when it needs to be but it will also be principled and it will save lives.

I call Brook van Velden.

Oh—

💬 Andrew Bayly: Really?

—thank you, Madam Speaker.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Barbara Kuriger): Yes. We’re up to call 10. You’re call 11, Mr Bayly.

💬 Dr Duncan Webb: I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. The Business Committee has resolved the split of calls, and the ACT Party gets one call in a debate at second reading.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Barbara Kuriger): So Labour Party took the Māori Party call, no one from Labour stood up to take the following call. And Brooke van Velden actually has stood up to take the call, so Brooke van Velden has the call.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s amazing what can happen in this Parliament if you’re willing to debate ideas. We need more people to take initiative in their own lives, like we need to take initiative in this Chamber to stand up and take calls.

I want to just start by refuting something that one of our Labour colleagues has just said: that they are proud of this law and they are proud of this law coming to Parliament. And I question how anyone in the Labour Party can be proud that they have created a law where it’s one rule for landlords and one rule for Labour. How can you be proud, as a Government, to create a healthy homes standards piece of legislation that said, “We expect all private landlords to come up to scratch with the healthy home standards by 1 July 2021, and if you have a new house or a renewed tenancy, we expect you, within 90 days of that deadline, to bring your House up to healthy homes standards. But we, as a Government, believe that we should have an extra two years beyond what a private landlord has.” I don’t understand how a Government can be proud that they hold private citizens at a much higher standard than they do of themselves. And yet, even when we get close to the deadline that the Government set for itself, it says, “Oh, sorry. It’s been a really, really tough time with COVID and we can’t meet that. We can’t even meet that standard that we set for ourselves, let alone the high standard for other people.”

But it’s constantly, from this Government, one rule for them and one rule for everybody else. And I just take the point that this is not the only piece of law that has put a division between private landlords and the Government. When we look at the interest deductibility rule changes that came through many months ago, we had the private landlords being told, “You, now, will have your interest deductibility limited, but not the Government. If it’s the Government, that’s something different. We can still deduct our interest, but just not the private landlords.”

And when I come to another example, it was about the heat pumps. Now, under the healthy homes standards, there are heating standards. A little while ago, we had the Government admit that it got the heat standards wrong, that private landlords had been spending up large on heat pumps that were overcooked for the size of the rooms that they were being put in. And we had, for months, landlords telling the Government, telling the Minister, Hon Dr Megan Woods, speaking publicly, emailing through that the heat pumps that they were being required to put into their own homes under the heat pump standards, or the heating standards, were way too big for the houses that they were being told to put them in. Nobody from the Government listened.

It just happened that I looked through a Cabinet paper and I saw that the Government, right before they decided that they actually needed to change the heating standard—bearing in mind the private landlords had been spending thousands of dollars on these already—had said, “Our own new Kāinga Ora developments won’t meet the heating standards and we’re going to go have to go back and spend millions of dollars on retrofitting brand new Kāinga Ora developments because they don’t meet our own heating standards.” That is another example of one rule for private landlords and another rule for the Government, because the Government didn’t care about private landlords and the huge cost that has been imposed. They just didn’t listen. They only cared about themselves and whether or not they would have to fork out millions of extra dollars because their own new developments didn’t meet their own healthy homes standards.

Parking those two issues, you’ve now got the whole issue of, well, the Government can’t get all of their Government-owned rental accommodation up to the standard that they expected of private landlords, so they are making an extension. But, a year ago, I was in this very Chamber asking for an extinction for private landlords because they had come to me to say, “We can’t meet the deadline because the Government has forced us into a lockdown.” Now, at that time, I tried to publicly advocate for these landlords, who are trying to do the right thing under the law, to make sure that their homes met the healthy homes standards, and the Government turned around and just said, “We don’t care.”

💬 Karen Chhour: Too bad.

Too bad, as my colleague Karen says. And people have forked out thousands of dollars, under time constraints, to bring their homes up to these standards, and the Government just said, “We don’t really care. If you miss the deadline, we’re not changing that for you.” Well, it turns out, when the Government realises they can’t meet their own deadline, well, they’ve got lots of compassion for themselves, but not for the private landlords.

💬 Karen Chhour: Shame.

So—I think it is shameful that this Government and members of the Labour Party can come to this House and say that they are proud of this law going through. They are proud of the fact that they couldn’t meet the standards. They are proud of the fact that they have to come and ask for another extension when they didn’t listen to the problems that private landlords were having with interest deductibility, where people have now had to sell their homes to tenants, who have been living in them for years on lower than market rent because they genuinely care about the community—they don’t care about that. They didn’t care about the fact that landlords were putting in heat pumps thousands of dollars more expensive than was actually required, because the Government got that wrong. And they didn’t care that landlords were very stressed that they couldn’t get their houses up to scratch within the prescribed deadlines because the Government had forced them into a lockdown and they physically couldn’t do it. But they only cared about themselves, because it’s one rule for everyone else, and one rule for Labour. I think they should be ashamed of that, not proud.

Well, thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s a pleasure to be talking at 10.37 p.m. on the Residential Tenancies (Healthy Homes Standards) Amendment Bill!

So I listened very carefully when the Minister of Housing introduced this bill tonight, earlier on, some time ago. When a Minister starts talking about taking a flexible and pragmatic approach, you know something’s really happening! I want to say what I really want to say, but in parliamentary language you just can’t say it, can you? But it means things haven’t gone well.

💬 Hon Scott Simpson: It could be a cluster!

Yeah, a bit of a cluster. But, anyway, what it really means is the Government hasn’t delivered again. That’s what it is. This is a bill about lack of delivery.

I’d be far more supportive of it—and I know we are going to support it—if the bill allowed private landlords to have an extension, but when you wrap in the Government organisation controlled by the Minister, and they’ve got 23,000 buildings, houses yet to update, and they’re the ones who put the rule in place—what the dickens!

Anyway, hopefully the Minister’s not going to stand up in a year’s time and say, “You’ve got to be flexible and pragmatic”—and it won’t be a COVID next time—hopefully, it’s not going to be another COVID reason. It can’t be nine years of neglect; no, that’s not going to work either.

💬 Stuart Smith: Five years of failure?

Oh, five years of failure; I don’t know, you don’t want to have six years of failure.

Well, anyway, we will support it. But the Government should have got its act together. The Minister should have been over the top of it. To use the term “flexible and pragmatic” is just an excuse.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. We are a pragmatic party. We don’t require people do the impossible. We don’t punish them for doing things that can’t be achieved. This is a simple response to some difficulties in supply chain and labour shortages. It’s a great bill. We’re still committed absolutely to healthy home standards. I commend this bill to the House.

Bill read a second time.

I declare the House in committee for consideration of the Residential Tenancies (Healthy Homes Standards) Amendment Bill.

In Committee

Part 1 Amendment to Residential Tenancies Act 1986