Prime Minister plays with red herrings while children sleep in cars
The housing catastrophe (Salvation Army description) for tenants and families on low incomes has been thrown into sharp relief by the appalling statistics that more than 200 children are now living in cars because there are not enough state houses.
Under the Labour government this number has gone from 51 at the end of 2017, to 228 in June this year. Similarly, the number of people living in tents has also climbed from 21 at the end of 2017 to 84 in June this year.
When confronted with these shocking figures of families and children still going backwards after five years of Labour governments the Prime Minister told TV1 News last night it was
“not acceptable for any family or individual to be living in a car which is why we’ve put so much effort into having built now over 10,000 public housing spaces, we’ve quadrupled the number of transitional homes, we’ve bought more public houses than anyone since the 1970s”.
“What you’re seeing in the data is we still have people who are coming to the Government to seek housing support… It’s then our job to get them into permanent housing.”
Ardern said in 2017 there was not an accurate picture of people living in crisis.
“At that time not everyone could receive the emergency housing special needs grant, not everyone could make it onto a public housing waitlist and not everyone was moving into permanent housing. We now have a situation where we have a much more accurate picture of the need that exists.”
Can you spot any red herrings there? Here are a few to start with
Labour may have built 10,000 state houses in the last five years BUT it has demolished thousands in the process. (In fact the government demolished more state houses than it built in six months of last year!)
Overall there has been a net increase in state houses of only 5,556 between September 2017 – when Labour came to power – and March 2022. Kainga Ora figures show
Total state housing stock at September 2017: = 63,209
Total state housing stock at June 2022: = 68,765
So much for the 10,000 built in 5 years. (Incidentally the first Labour government, faced with a housing crisis, built 10,000 houses per year in the later 1930s!)
This 1,110 extra state houses being provided each year by Labour (5,556 over five years) is for a state house waiting list which has risen to a staggering 26,664 at June 2022.
Check out the graph. There were just over 5,000 on the state house waiting list when Labour came to power in late 2017 – now there are 26,664! And Labour is providing just an extra 1,110 per year.
On this basis some desperate families will be waiting till 2048 to get a state house.
And despite what the PM implies, the criteria for getting on to the state house waiting list has not changed since Labour came to government. It’s the same criteria as National used.
The reason the government is demolishing so many state house each year is partly to replace houses that are past their use-by-date but more importantly it is so the government can sell vast swathes of land to private property developers and then use the proceeds to fund state house building rather than put up any money itself. In fact Labour is in the middle of the biggest privatisation of state assets – crown land – since the 1980s.
The country needs an industrial-scale state house building programme but Labour is selling crown land that could enable this and seems determined to keep state housing at just 3.6% of total housing stock (it was 5.4% in 1990)
And for those that might think all this ignores government support of the many small social housing providers, it doesn’t. Government policy remains to provide just an extra 1600 IRRS (Income-related Rental subsidies) per year to cover both state and social housing providers – for a waiting list of close to 27,000.
Labour just doesn’t care. If you think they do care about housing for those on low incomes – show me the evidence!
So now the PM says that finally after five years of Labour
“We now have a situation where we have a much more accurate picture of the need that exists.”
Too pathetic for words.
And too sad for the children who will be sleeping in a car in your city tonight.
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.
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 till 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. of people some of whom state agencies would not touch. Papa Kainga family based self builds are increasing.
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.
No one, or not enough, people care. That’s why we won’t introduce a CGT . The PM absolutely sold out for votes. Tax free gain on property and ridiculous rent increases from private citizens who are providing “a service” who are happy to keep hiking rents ( and don’t give me some rubbish about interest rates going up this has been happening for ages) and scream when attempts are taken to make properties liveable, are how we roll. Ultimately both main parties are a reflection of too many eligible voters on this issue. As Martyn has pointed out Labour are the same as National in terms of state owned housing as a percentage of housing stock.
How many of the state houses that were demolished were being lived in? While the eligibility to get on the list for a state house may have stayed the same you neglect to mention the increase in rental rates for private rentals. I am not pretending that the system is anywhere close to perfect but unless you can get enough voters to support leaders who want to bring the change you are basically just p….ing into the wind.
I know there have been instances where existing state tenants were displaced to allow new units to be built but I have no idea how common that was.
Why do we endlessly end up with a debate in here about whether the Nats would do better. Frankly I don ‘t either of them to be in power, they are shits, neither of them care about the dispossessed those at the bottom of the heap. Labour was meant to be a party for the working class, it hasn’t been for years and years and years. Both parties follow the same mantra – the market the market the market.
I don’t care who gets in frankly I know if it is the Nats then thousands, who voted for labour, will come out on the streets. There is so little between them. Labour aren’t prepared to put taxes up to any significant number for the richest.
When the Nats were last in power they changed the rules around being able to get a state house and cut the number on the waiting list considerably. Labour were outraged!!!! Did Labour on coming to office backtrack the Nats changes to the waiting list. Of course not!
Labour squeal at any change when in opposition but they never ever back track on the oppositions legislation.
I may be a cynic but I hate them all. I am looking to the te pati Maori for the next election.
While I see your point I would say minimum, and other wage, increases are one point of difference for those in work. Also National means Act and I can’t see 7bil in spending cuts working out well. David Seymour is NZ’s answer to Margret Thatcher.
100% agree John. It is our pre eminent national shame and there are many to choose from.
I had a builder friend who specialized in buying old state houses and doing them up if possible .He said they were all built by excellent tradesmen especially after the war and used good timber .The main problem was many of the houses were poorly maintained by iether te ant or owner (the State). This sad state of affairs was under both Labour and z National governments.
The last few years have seen many homes wreaked by unruly tenants with none being booted out and in some cases the good tenant next door is the one told to move.
State houses are a great idea but better protection of the asset needs to be enforced
Unfortunately the government is oblivious to the impact of poverty and homelessness, or they would address it realistically. The personal and societal and health impacts are beyond their ken, and their refusal to heed expert opinion suggests a callous mindset which sweet words or furrowed brows don’t temper. At this stage Social Welfare Minister Children’s Commissioner hater Sepuloni should be tendering her resignation as an abject failure, and the Minister for Children Davis should too, if he can keep off the phone for long enough.
Raise the IQ of both nations.
Hey’_ more than 200 children sleeping in cars’……Houston, we have a problem!!!
“By the end of this decade more than 50% of monthly vehicle sales in New Zealand need to be electric in order to meet our emissions reductions targets.” so says eeca: https://www.eeca.govt.nz/insights/eeca-insights/electric-vehicles-and-aotearoa/
Well newsflash – EV’s are powered by lithium-ion batteries which under certain conditions, like too little charge, too much charge, etc. will spontaneously combust.
Recently deceased Anne Heche, may she rest in peace, burned in her electric mini cooper for over an hour whilst rescuers fought to get her out. (Apparently, there are major problems with grounding one of those suckers before jaws of life can be deployed safely.) She is not the first to perish so violently. The safety/conflict issue over massive lithium-ion battery production has hardly been looked at.
Are we really such fools as to imagine children sleeping in cars, unless they’re a ’60’s model station wagon built to last forever, are not at HUGE RISK?
Ask yourself, where would you feel safest, a) or b)?
a) Mr HQ :https://themotorhood.com/themotorhood/2017/12/4/a-great-way-to-move-1974-hq-holden-kingswood-station-wagon
b) Mr Leaf :https://www.carmagazine.co.uk/electric/cheapest-electric-car/