Groser Tim: Affordable Housing: Enabling Territorial Authorities Bill — Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
Groser Tim: Affordable Housing: Enabling Territorial Authorities Bill — Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:649;Page:18474] 
TIM GROSER (National) 
: 
 Had I heard that explanation I possibly would not have risen to take a brief call. I have to be honest: in coming down to the Chamber it was not my intention to take a call on Part 1 of the Affordable Housing: Enabling Territorial Authorities Bill but merely to enrich my parliamentary experience by listening to my National Party colleagues go through this bill with their customary forensic skills and tear the logic and ambiguities of Part 1 apart. 
As members may have noticed I was sitting next to my parliamentary colleague Mr Keith Locke from the Green Party—a man whom I have known for 40 years. We were discussing the strategic outlook for Hezbollah in the Lebanon which is probably not quite part of Part 1. But I was forced to rise to my feet by the very observation that you have just made Madam Chair. I wrote it down as: “Part 1 does not require us to focus on solutions to affordable housing.” I thought that this was very intriguing given that the immediate description of the title of Part 1 is “Meeting housing needs”. I thought that we can afford to say this— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Marian Hobbs) 
: Could the speaker resume his seat. The directions I give are not debatable. I have given a direction; it is not up for debate now. Please focus on Part 1 of the bill. Thank you. 
TIM GROSER 
: Thank you; most certainly. The problem is trying to work out what exactly Part 1 is trying to fix. When I started to read this bill in the House just about 10 minutes ago I found the most childish drafting I think I have seen in my brief time in Parliament. Let me give members an example. Clause 6 states: “Territorial authorities that want to find out whether there is enough affordable housing in their districts …”. This sounds like a third-form essay on the issue. 
Then when we come across other clauses we find bold declaratory statements. For example let me take clause 13 “Criteria for allocation” which states: “An affordable housing policy must state the criteria …”. This sounds bold and decisive but when we look at the operational clauses dealing with the criteria which are contained in clause 10 we then find out that the criteria are a purely illustrative list of criteria that have no particular force whatsoever. It states: “(1) An affordable housing policy must state the criteria …”. It then lists a series of criteria such as “(a) the proposed location of the development:” and “(b) the kind of development proposed …”. But it is quite clear from later parts of Part 1 that this does not exclude the possibility that a local authority may decide on other criteria which makes a nonsense of omitting paragraphs (c) (d) and (e) from clause 10(2). 
The whole bill is a complete artifice. It has no intrinsic content whatsoever. One has to ask oneself why Part 1 is in this bill and what its actual real purpose is. It seems to me—and no doubt we will come to this in a more complete examination of the bill when we start to look at it in total—that this is essentially a political fig leaf. This bill does not actually do anything. It is permissive of a policy that local authorities may in any event already do. It does not add anything to the sum of human knowledge in our country whatsoever. It is simply a political fig leaf for this Government to cover up 9 years of inaction on affordable housing.