The madness of using the free market to solve a problem caused by an unregulated free market has finally been buried.
Labour thankfully killed off KiwiBuild because as TDB pointed out years ago, the 100 000 affordable house promise was a political stunt pulled by David Shearer to fend off a challenge from David Cunliffe in 2012.
The ultimate problem is that neoliberalism has gutted public servants who do into public servant who manage so when we needed houses built, they was no Ministry of Works to do it.
The tiny glints of progress with shared home ownership options and lowering the deposit thresholds are just that, tiny glints of progress, the massive dead rat is the loss of building 100 000 houses.
Instead, the Government should turn its hand to rebuilding a ministry that actually builds houses and those houses should be state houses. By mass building sustainable state houses that are warm and dry using the best technology, you lift the threshold of basic accomodation in a way that forces the rest of the market to adopt those baselines, if Labour refuse to challenge the free market, they should at least weight the outcomes in such a way that forces the market to change.
Slum lords get away with shit rentals because there is so much desperate need at the bottom, build 30 000 state houses and watch that desperation recede, which in turn creates real choice into the market place with in turn punishes slum lords who don’t care.
Labour have at least shown the courage to change a stupid and poorly thought out policy, why it’s taken them so long is a question Jacinda Ardern as a leader who tolerated far too much waffle from Phil Twyford is still on the hook to answer.
Just build 30 000 bloody state houses already Labour!
I want to set up a give a little page so we can raise money for a dictionary so we can send it to Jacinda so she can learn what the word ‘transformative’ actually means.
The good news is that the sudden fear of losing Winston to the Grim Reaper has put a rocket up Labour and they are announcing new ideas and new laws left, right and centre.
Feed the kids school lunches, a cap on loan sharks and $60million extra into cancer, you get the feeling this spurt of looking like they are doing something that has real impact on peoples lives is being driven by the realisation that we are 12 months from the next election and Labour have bugger all to show for its time in office.
Sure, feed the kids only impacts 10% of those kids in need, the cap on loan sharks still allows for 300% interest and the $60m thrown at cancer is a play to middle class boomers, but it’s all we’ve got between us and Judith Collins as Prime Minister.
Let’s count our blessings despite Labour’s limp mojo.
If you have circa 300,000 incoming immigration into NZ every year, you will never be able to solve the housing crisis, especially as the jobs people come for are poor quality service type roles or 1 year ‘business masters’ with free work permit and residency post degree, and are more a scam than a job or real degree.
NZ has become dysfunctional by essentially exporting profits overseas and importing overseas workers into a welfare system that is helping support them and thus the resulting Ponzi is keeping wages unliveable and bizarre statistics aka NZ has the most drug and bank profits, the highest childcare costs and one of the lowest innovation levels in the OECD.
If the government went back to pre Rogernomics immigration with real criteria, like language tests, making sure that the job was real and a local could not do it, making it more expensive for employers to look elsewhere so they train and invest in locals and their own communities instead, then existing houses would be freed up, infrastructure freed up, pollution less and wages would go up…. taxpayer money would be recycled locally not constantly being eaten up by all the effects of increased low waged or non waged population growth and lower wages overall in terms of costs of living, as a medium (not an average as the 8 million salaries kinda skew the NZ statistics on averages).
The rental idea though is better than the KiwiBuild idea, however you still need a stable, reasonably well paid job to be able to rent for 30 years and pay your mortgage, is NZ going in that direction????? nope!!!!
Blame the immigrants – that’s right – it’s the fault of exploited under, payed service workers whose visa’s are tied to their employment. I’ve worked with people in this situation and it makes my blood boil with pure rage.
We should be fighting for these people and against their employers – blaming the powerless, poor and exploited is a classic political ploy and will garner huge electorate backing from an easily manipulated working class – take a look at Brexit. It’s a massive distraction from the real class conflict that needs to be confronted and exposed.
Nope blame the governments immigration policy. They are encouraging hundreds of thousands of people into NZ every year to compete for work and housing and benefits or do an overpriced, worthless, degree that you cheat to pass, and giving citizenship and permanent residency to the migrants who are some of the worst abusers of other migrants!
Somebody is not exactly doing their homework on the character tests for residency, probably because you can get it with fake documentation and so quickly too. Apparently 65% of all the people caught in labour abuses are former migrants turned NZ citizens. There used to be a character test, what the F happened to that one???
When anybody calls it out, then the wokies rush around saying ‘blaming immigrants’ .
However they are no longer immigrants because you can get citizenship in NZ in 11 days or become a ‘Kiwi’ while in jail for drugs crimes or get off money laundering charges because you might not get residency and the first thing anybody does when hitting NZ shores is to have a baby with a NZ passport holder, (quickly split up after) so they can’t be deported easily due to the baby being able to claim NZ citizenship, which is pretty low to procreate for that purpose.
Those are the ‘cream’ of new immigrants coming to NZ and getting the passport! Probably the honest migrants, don’t get permanent residency because they are not criminal or prepared to deceive, enough! Scams are pretty much encouraged now in NZ, there are so many cases of people getting off criminal charges, just because apparently it is detrimental to their chances of residency. So pushing that forward it seems that we are actively trying to recruit the more criminally minded and dishonest into NZ to prey on others already in the country!
Becoming normal, do we really need to be giving car dealer workers residency because it is such an in demand skills? Sarcasm. More low waged workers and bad companies operating in NZ… under our deregulated Ponzi immigration criteria.
If the migrant does return with his family if he had permanent residency then he can just go on the dole with his family and pay back the money at $10 p/w… meanwhile the car dealer workers can probably use being defrauded to cry and get residency too…
Auckland car dealer told to pay missing wages has left the country, officials say
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/115434584/manurewa-car-dealer-to-pay-31000-following-labour-inspectors-investigation
The problem people, is that we have a welfare system so having more and more takers of tax dollars and less and less givers who are expected to give more and more, is eventually going to burst the NZ welfare system!
Shutting the door on cheap labour immigration as they actually promised might help lessen the rising demand too.
But that would require actually fulfilling an election promise.
Much earnest nodding of head required here then, sitting forward on the seat and deploying the concern face, possibly the new head scarf.
Yep, charge on with flat pack dwellings from offshore, if the local industry and developers are going to be obstructive.
A massive State house/apartment build, Tiny houses for homeless, emergency housing, and some 21st Century version of State Advances are all needed. It is unrealistic to expect this Govt. to be anything other than its Roger’n’Ruth backstory.
But nonetheless, they have to be re-elected so that when the generational voter shift occurs in 2023, there is a chance to finally bury SOEs and all the rest of it.
How come our weak and gutless media haven’t asked judeath what her housing plan is, her party have had 2 years now in opposition and they had 9 years beforehand to come up with a good housing policy and they didn’t, why? Instead there policy was all about selling state houses taking this land for developers to build expensive houses mostly sold to foreigners. I can see 800k plus homes in the Lower hutt struggling to sell and to me this says the developers got our cheap state land were selling mainly to foreigners i can see one HNZ section in the Hutt Valley all sold to foreign Chinese and how do i know the builders told me and in my view this is wrong and this was nationals policy and that state land was for working class kiwis not foreigners so judeath saying it a croxs when asked by corin dann and his bloody piss weak interview this morning on RNZ is joke.
Deflection nonsense. Our sides in power now and we are failing. We have the ability to make a difference, so in the worlds of Ardern #letsdothis.
if you rearrange the letters, #letsdothis the last part also comes out as #letsdoshit
+1 Collins blaming labour for the housing crisis is a joke, hopefully the crusher retires on her vast swamp Kauri & Chinese loot and no doubt plenty of board positions in the veins of #facadeNZpoliticanlikeJennyShipleyforNZassetstrippingboardposition
Labour might be clueless on housing, but they did not cause the problem, the Natz did, and wilfully too.Phil did not understand what was going on and thought the construction industry and housing providers & COO were independent. Ignorance though should not be an excuse.
I agree. Collins smirking away in her typically petty manner has never offered a thing that could be construed as positive to this country, much less on housing.
As for Twyford, there’s more to come. He remains Transport Minister, most unfortunately, and is failing to deliver Jacinda’s promise of light rail in Auckland within 4 years (or ever) not to mention the failed Auckland Harbour Bridge pedestrian crossing. Why is he still there?
So much credibility damaged and all down to one hopeless individual who should have had far more oversight focused on him far far sooner by his boss.
RIP Kiwibuild, I would come to your wake but as a GenXer without a trust fund I can’t afford a bus fare let alone a house deposit
So now you only need to own the Kiwi build apartment for one year? And there is no asset test for ‘second chancers’….both these aspects should provide nice headline fodder in years to come. I’m sure the renting classes will be well amused at the wave of baby boomer owned kiwibuild rentals and airbnbs on offer…
Labour has to bite the bullet and reform the RMA and local government planning, free up land supply, and allow new council debt mechanisms.
Twyford is now talking about this and looking into it – but it is nearly two years into this term of government, and it is what he should have been planning and preparing before the 2017 election.
It is now too late to deliver before the next election, so it’s a promise for after the next election and who will believe Labour now?.
Heard of Ihumatao? Great example of SHA zoning changes… working out marvellously. sarcasm.
Bella Visa, Victopia…quality building on offer sarcasm… rebuilt practically before their paint gets too dry… if they are even lived in at all before being condemned.
and what are they building… 2 bedroom and 2 bathroom apartments which are not exactly affordable at over 1 million dollars https://www.trademe.co.nz/property/residential-property-for-sale/auction-2237487971.htm?rsqid=ba42e66c571f48a1afa7c533f70aaf02-003… so building more houses and deregulating zoning ain’t the answer because the quality and price bears no relation to any sort of housing outcome for most people living in NZ, does not address the treaty aims, but taking up prime real estate for others to speculate on!
They don’t get it, SaveNZ, or do not even want to get it.
I have a solution. Tell Labour to try and do absolutely nothing, it worked for National for 9 years!
They are already on that one, Bert. Quick get the support services out, I hear there is a transgender up for criminal charges in this depraved case, hopefully the police don’t ‘trigger’ her, sarcasm, probably no justice or mercy given to the teenage victim, which is slowly becoming the norm in our justice system…. https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12265048
You see !
You can write intelligent articles without swearing.
Just a reminder.
If we had the Crusher in the present environment and in power she would really see to the actual building of state houses in record time.
Watch those words.
Soon we’ll receive that very policy promise from her I believe.
It’s worth at least 20 % of Labourer voters in this coming election!
Jacques
“Oravida build”, palatial mansions built from swamp Kauri on the North Shore using imported Chinese labour, it’ll be treat.
Kiwibuild should have been run as a NZ industry from the grass roots up. Keep the logs we currently export in the country and turn them into prefabricated houses in a government owned or funded factory. You keep sawmills open, housing factories open, creating employment and houses by kiwis for kiwis. The neo liberal solution of just buying houses off developers was farcical. They have no interest in prices dropping.
An example – there’s ample ability to flood the wellington market with houses. There are huge swathes of land and new developments north of the city, think churton park, Woodridge, Grenada, Newlands, but they are all owned and controlled by a select group of developers who drip feed houses into the market to maintain sky high prices. They could easily flood the market but why would they. This is where kiwibuild should have been disruptive.
You cant be disruptive when you don’t have the builders
Housing, immigration and the growth mantra, are related issues that the government has no clue about solving. Jacinda has to do something significant. Time is running out for her and her empathy.
You can’t ask the free market to solve these problems but then taking that notion to its natural conclusion you can’t ask a neo liberal free market orientated government to either. If we want change we need new parties that are not “neo liberal”.
If this Labour party was adhering to its real socialist beliefs they would have known what too do about housing and got on with it and be achieving results in this area and many others that need urgent attention two years into its term and Winston despite MMP would have known what was NOT negotiable in any deals to form a government.
Their historic purpose was always repairing the damage inflicted by Tory governments on their abused supporters.
National don’t deviate from their core beliefs of gutting public services , and governing for foreign interests and the wealthy with a program of tax cuts and cruelty too the poor so why does Labour and the left ?
Neo liberalism is the enemy and until a political party is brave enough too confront it there will be no improvement in many of the crises we are grappling with.
If we continue with two main right wing blocks committed to the same ideology and no real democratic socialist party then MMP will not deliver a government we desperately need.
Nailed it – the current Labour government look like a place holder for the National party. We’ll keep the benches warm while you take a 3 year break and don’t worry we’ll do absolutely nothing of significance while your away.
LABOUR’S FAILURE.
This by Idiot Savant on the subject of foodbanks.
http://norightturn.blogspot.com/2019/09/labours-failure.html
There is no solidity to modern Labour — wet sympathies aside. You have to go back to Kirk. And all his comrades 9 years later were bought off or squashed somehow.
A country run by idiots and jerks for idiots.
We can moan as much as we like but we need to come up with creditable solutions
“The only way to solve housing problems in NZ is to ramp up supply. That means Housing NZ is going to have to enter the property market as a property developer in the social housing, affordable housing area because the private market is broken”.
So, put to use Twyfords best achievement, the Pt England Development & Enabling Act and confiscate some land with it for Housing!
Venezuela,”8000 Houses built for the poor, this week!”
Venezuelan Housing Mission Passes ‘Milestone’ with 2.5M Homes
The goal of Venezuela’s Great Housing Mission (GMVV) is to build at least five million homes by the end of 2025.
Considering the embargoes and the pressure theyre under. Theyre able to build houses, whereas lame ass little ole NZ just doesnt have balls to do anything, especially been in a much better situation.
Success for Labour:
Dump Twyford from everything including Minister of Transport
Dump the dead beat Auckland airport tram.
Announce GST being reduced to 10% to boost spending.
Build 30k state houses.
Dump the regressive Auckland 11.5 cents fuel tax (poorest hit the most).
Like it or not, NZ First will be in parliament again next election and is more stable partner than Greens who will die.
The assistance to help more into home ownership is OK, but lower deposits (mortgage affordability constraint blocks access to most) rent to buy and shared equity developments are not direct methods to boost supply and reduce property values and rent costs.
Now that there is no longer a plan to build more homes (apart from 1000 state homes a year) there will be three outcomes
1. homelessness will become normalised (as will motels being permanently used as emergency housing)
2. poverty caused by high rents will become permanent
3. food bank demand will remain at record levels
Widespread roll out Food in (low decile) school areas and expansion of the Power Supplement to those will be first resorts.
Your preference for a singular focus on increasing supply via state housing is all very well – but there is no government budget allocation for this. And so in reality this reset simply means things are not going to get better for most – apart from those who can afford mortgage cost (lower deposit) or who access the rent to buy and shared equity (capped amounts).
My preferred option would have been
1. an expansion in those who could buy the Kiwi Build homes – those upsizing from one bedroom apartments and flats (to start families) and those 55-70 downsizing from family section homes.
2. homes not sold being bought by government and used as state houses (rent to buy etc coming in later)
Comments are closed.