GUEST BLOG: Pat O’Dea – Prime Minister stands by despite a promise not to

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Let them eat cake live in cars

The Prime Minister ‘stands by’, despite a promise not to.

The Prime Minister and her husband and daughter need to live in a car even for just a week, to see if it weakens the Prime Minister’s refusal to honour the promise she made to children living in cars. Let’s see if living in a car with her husband and child for a week weakens the Prime Minister’s post election decision to protect the capital gains of the housing speculators instead of the homeless.

2017 TVNZ video archive soundtrack @ 0:43 seconds Leader of the Opposition Jacinda Ardern. “I refuse to stand by while children are sleeping in cars”

2022 Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, ‘Stands by’

Number of children listed as living in cars more than 200

Source: 1News
The number of children living in cars has gone up dramatically since the Government came to power….
Prime Minister Ardern ‘Stands By’
“I refuse to stand by while people are living in cars”

The housing crisis could be fixed with the stroke of a pen.
Pick up your pen Prime Minister, keep your promise. Stop ‘standing by’. Make it illegal for perfectly good homes to be left empty.
Fine the owners to pressure them to sell or rent these homes out. Fix the housing crisis with your pen.
Prime Minister Ardern. Why are you doing this?

Are the “Wealth Storing” creeps more important to you, than the suffering of families and children living in cars?

 

What Auckland’s ‘ghost homes’ could do for the housing crisis

There are about 40,000 ‘ghost houses’ in Auckland. Cat MacLennan asks if a tax on these empty homes could help house homeless people and low-income workers.

TDB Recommends NewzEngine.com

….According to the 2018 Census, there are approximately 40,000 empty private homes in Auckland. That is 7.3 percent of the total, up from 6.6 percent in the previous Census in 2013. And Auckland is not the only place in Aotearoa with vacant homes at a time when accommodation is expensive and in short supply…

….a significant number are empty simply because the owners are focused on capital gains. This is now an international phenomenon. In England it is called “buy to leave,” in New York it is described as “warehousing,” while in British Columbia it is known as “wealth storing”.

 

 

Pat O’Dea is a trade unionist and human rights activist.

38 COMMENTS

  1. But…but…it would be worse under National’?
    ‘whatifs’ and ‘whataboutisms’ isn’t that what the lefties only have in replying to such dismal stats!
    No point in discussing the failure of St Jacinda’s last 5yrs when you have ‘whatabout’s’ and ‘whatif’s’!…..Sorted!

    • Modern ‘Labour’ isn’t left-wing in any way. Walter Nash wouldn’t recognize these trash as his successors, let alone the original founders.

    • Im right when National left office there was 1500 less state houses available for the people you claim to care about. They also used HNZ as a cash cow taking millions out of this portfolio that could have been used to build more houses and purchase land. National have a reputation for selling state houses Labour have a reputation for building them. Willis admitted they sold houses she also admitted to other issues relevant to this issue.

      • Yeah what if Labour were worse than National, National would be in government. Seems Jacindas failures are still better than National or any of their wannabe leaders.
        Whatifs…sorted.
        What if any one of I’m wrongs opinions were right…what if?

    • Im right August 19, 2022 at 6:43 am

      “…‘whatifs’ and ‘whataboutisms’ isn’t that what the lefties only have in replying to such dismal stats!”

      No, not at all, ;whatifs’ and ‘whataboutisms’ is not what this post is about at all.

      If you had bothered to read the end of my post, (which from your comment you obviously haven’t), you would see a clear solution to the problem of families and children having to live in cars.

      It is not ‘What If’ can be done. But, ‘What Is’ can be done right now, by this government.

      There are 40,000 empty houses in Auckland. If they don’t need them, the owners of these “Ghost Homes” need to be forced to either sell them or rent them out.

      https://www.newsroom.co.nz/cat-maclennan-on-ghost-housing

      …..the most alarming aspect of this phenomenon is that it means that building more houses might not, in fact, mean more people obtain homes. Counterintuitively, rather than providing shelter for the homeless, constructing more homes might simply be increasing the pool of investment properties….

      …..A number of countries now tax homes left vacant for long periods. This raises revenue that councils can use for empty homes work but, more importantly, it is designed to nudge property owners into turning their houses back into homes.

      Vancouver was the first city in North America to introduce a tax on empty houses. The 1 percent tax was levied on 2538 vacant homes in 2017, but on only 1989 properties in 2018. A 22 percent drop in the number of vacant homes taxed occurred at the same time as the number of properties rented to tenants climbed by 7 percent. There was also a 21 percent leap in the number of condos being rented out in the city.

        • Bob you ask; Can they afford the rent.

          Well obviously, No! That is part of the reason shy these houses are empty.

          But let’s invert your question.

          Can the rich afford to keep them empty?

          Well obviously, Yes! So let us make it too expensive for even rich people to leave them empty, then they would have to tenant them. Which would mean the rich owners of empty homes would have to lower the rents to affordable levels. Either that, or sell them at affordable prices.

          Housing criisis solved.

          The Prime Minister can stop standing by while children are sleeping in cars.

  2. I call bullshit on poverty. It’s time to scrap all benefits and shut down MSD because poverty no longer exists in NZ.
    How can it be when Adern promised to fix it?

  3. I live in Chch and there are 3 houses in our street that sit empty for long periods .I spoke to one owner who travels away a lot and he said he used to rent his house out but now there are so many hurdles to jump over to make it up to speed for renting then it can be hard to move them out at the end of the period .He finds it easier to let it sit.
    I am sure all the protection and safeguards were put in with the best of intention but there are often unseen concequences to any action.
    The state themselves are slow in getting their own houses up,to speed but I agree with them being able to buy empty houses for a fair price and us as rentals .It would be far cheaper than paying for motel units which are only marginally better than cars.
    s

    • and these exact hurdles are trev…the house needs to have a roof or can’t be sinking in a swamp or maybe must have doors….spare me the ‘poor put upon landlord spiel’

  4. NZ is fundamentally and structurally f**ked and getting worse by the day and not one of the major parties as it stands are going to change any of this – and the super flaky and dangerous parties such as the Greens and especially the Maori Party should be sent to a gulag somewhere if they manage to bullshit their way any closer to holding real political power (the Putin Apologists on here in particular should like this suggestion).
    What we need is a new socialist political party in NZ that is not drowning in woke bullshit and which is fuelled by a single-minded goal each and every day as they enter parliament which is how can I make NZ better for all NZ’ers (+ removing any restrictions on kids playing tackle bullrush at school).

      • Covid is pa – Your culture may be Maori and if you are indeed Maori I totally understand your being proud of it / wanting to speak Te Reo etc however the wokeness comes into it when others who are not Maori are increasingly having this forced upon them / Maori culture increasingly being portrayed as the only culture in NZ of any merit or significance.

      • Further Covid is pa re my ‘how can I make NZ better for all NZ’ers’ comment above not only do I not want you to ‘not have anything in your own country’ I in fact want you to have as much as you possibly and sustainably can have in your own country provided that this doesn’t then in turn then mean that your fellow NZ’ers receive less or their own culture less is respected and recognised simply because they are not Maori.

  5. Natzos won’t be building adequate numbers of state houses either-it is the neo liberal way-and will not change until thousands of people get politically organised, campaign, and occupy empty residential & commercial property. Don’t tax ghost houses–squat in them, run small businesses and store stuff in them–that will soon get the politicians attention.

    That won’t happen the usual suspects may say, and if the extent of your ‘political activity’ is moaning on blogs then you are prob right! But many are still active in community affairs, like the late Ricky Houghton in Kaitaia whose He Korowai Trust actually housed hundreds in little groups of relocated and newly built dwellings. People some of whom state agencies would not touch. Papa Kainga family based self builds are increasing too.

    Flat pack modular housing is available, tiny houses for individual homeless, a stock of emergency housing in every town, take over more golf courses and race courses and odd shaped Linz sections-could all be done. But the neo libs support private capital developers over public works all day everyday-it is a political problem as much as a housing problem.

  6. And what’s more , one of Walter Nash’s grandsons is a part of this disgraceful, government. I don’t know how he sleeps at night. I wouldn’t be surprised to see some defections from LP before the end election. Labour is rotten to the core.

  7. Yes magit when you turn into a blow fly you can fly away I suggest Australia that is nice and close and take bob the knob with ya

  8. The Daily Blog Archives June 25, 2015

    Meet the new boss same as the old boss

    Parked Up

    https://thedailyblog.co.nz/2015/06/25/guest-blog-pat-odea-0800-parked-up/

    Dear Nick Smith, who cares if these 22,000 Auckland homes are being kept empty deliberately, or is just careless?

    You’re the Housing Minister, how about some legislation to allow councils to penalise this obscenity with a sliding scale of punitive rates increases, until this ugly phenomenom is done away with.

    Such a measure from your government as well as addressing homelessness, would also ease the dangerous housing bubble, that threatens to blow up at any time….

    7 years on that any time moment has arrived.

    https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/money/2020/05/new-zealand-s-housing-bubble-on-the-brink-of-bursting-global-economist.html

  9. Why are our political leaders hell bent on building more houses instead of freeing up the existing ones?

    Keith Rankin quotes Gareth Morgan to give us a clue, that our political leaders and media are in on this scam.

    “LOOK HOW MANY POLITICIANS OWN MULTIPLE HOUSES. WE’RE ALL ON THIS GRAVY TRAIN NOW. LOOK AT ME, I OWN SIX HOUSES. I DON’T HAVE TENANTS; THEY JUST MAKE CARPETS DIRTY…..” Gareth Morgan

    https://thedailyblog.co.nz/2016/04/19/gareth-morgan-and-multiple-empty-houses/

    ,i>He [Morgan] puts his money where his mouth is; he, as a more-than-slightly-rich person, shows us how the slightly rich and not-so-famous (the “you” in his quote) seek to ‘make money’ by doing absolutely nothing other than withdraw good houses, simultaneously, from both the rental and the owner-occupier housing markets. We even have the gall to call this activity ‘investment’.

    More pertinently, he’s saying that politicians do the same thing as he is doing: sitting on empty properties, withdrawing houses from the housing supply. And he’s kind-of suggesting that people well connected in the media do it as well. No wonder neither the politicians nor the mainstream media want to address the issue;….”

  10. Unfortunately Gareth Morgan is not the only one.

    ‘Lockdown project’: NZ’s richest man Graeme Hart starts on Auckland house-buying spree
    New Zealand Herald
    By Anne Gibson
    5 Feb, 2022 05:00 AM
    5 mins to read

    If you were New Zealand’s wealthiest person, where would you buy houses in Auckland?

    Maybe Remuera or Epsom for school zones? Mission Bay for the waterfront? The CBD for convenience?

    How about Mt Wellington?

    Because….. (pay walled).

    https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/lockdown-project-nzs-richest-man-graeme-hart-starts-on-auckland-house-buying-spree/GJTJX2BUJQCWQGKAP7BBCMG5WY/#commenting-widget

  11. Despite promising not to, our PM is comfortable to stand by while children live in cars* the Mayor of Vancouver isn’t.

    Vancouver’s tripled empty homes tax brings in $32M, leads to decline in vacant property: mayor

    Published April 13, 2022 4:37 a.m. NZST
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    Vancouver’s mayor says his decision to triple the city’s tax on homeowners who leave their property sitting empty did translate to a decline in vacancies last year.

    Kennedy Stewart said preliminary data showed fewer vacant properties in the city, meaning more of those homes are being rented out to residents.

    A factor in the city’s previous vacancy rate of near zero, which contributed to the highest rental rates in the country, was that many property owners were leaving their homes empty much of the year.

    The goal of the so-called empty homes tax was to encourage those owners to rent out their empty spaces, or pay more if they chose not to.

    https://bc.ctvnews.ca/vancouver-s-tripled-empty-homes-tax-brings-in-32m-leads-to-decline-in-vacant-property-mayor-1.5858832

    It seems that some of the wealthier owners of empty homes are prepared to pay the tax rather than rent or sell them. The Mayor says the $32 million raised this way will be used by the city to build affordable homes and other initiatives to end homelessness in Vancouver.

    We could do this for the whole country. If only we had a Prime Minister who didn’t lie about not standing by while children live in cars.

  12. any property not rented out for a year..forfeited to the state and either rented or the land used for new social housing….if people are going to act out of selfish self interest the people should be able to reply to that in practical ways…ie the ‘selfish’ desire for social housing.

  13. Jacinda Ardern revealed to Jack Tane her promises were aspirations only so child poverty will continue under her leadership.

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