Bidois DanDAN BIDOIS (National—Northcote): It is a pleasure to take a brief call on the Residential Tenancies (Prohibiting Letting Fees) Amendment Bill. I want to disclose certainly that I am a renter and therefore according to the contribution by Chlöe Swarbrick I must have greater moral authority than any other member of this House to speak on this bill. If the contribution from Chlöe Swarbrick has indicated anything to us it is that the Green Party will certainly not at any stage be given the responsibility over the economy or housing because that contribution quite frankly had no substance at all.But I do want to talk about some aspects of this bill that I feel quite passionately about. We've had a debate around the letting fee and the structure of the letting fees and quite frankly I don't think that this is a good bill. To paraphrase my colleague the Hon Dr Nick Smith it's a smoke-and-mirrors bill. In fact you could call it a fake news bill where the Government thinks that they're going to take letting fees off and that's going to save tenants money but in fact they haven't thought through the unintended consequences of this bill and that is that it's going to add to rents which will significantly affect long-term tenants.I want to in fact get to some of the submissions because I think that through the submission process a lot of good ideas came through that I would like the Minister in the chair Phil Twyford to respond to. A lot of these ideas were not about banning the letting fee structure but about improving the market for letting fees improving the transparency of letting fees. I hear the Minister say that in fact the current system is not transparent and that is why we have the bill that we've got before us today. But I put it to the Minister that there are ways to improve the transparency of the current letting fee market without a straight-up ban. So I would like to know from the Minister why he did not look at alternative ways to improve the letting fee market without a straight-up ban.Other ideas that came up through the letting fees submission process were around splitting the fees between tenants and landlords. What we've heard from the opposite side of the House for the last few months is that the benefits and the value of letting fees are much more accrued or significantly accrued to the landlords. But what we heard from the submission process is that in fact there is value in tenants using the services of the property managers in terms of helping them to get vetted quickly in terms of giving them insurance over the property that they're about to rent and in terms of giving them some certainty even past the point at which they have moved into the house.I certainly in my instance am able to go back to my property manager at any time and say Well can I have this done or that done to my property?" And so it goes that the relationship between the tenant and the property manager lasts far beyond the short-term viewing of the contract which has been under discussion.A third aspect that I'd like the Minister to certainly answer is around what we call a code of conduct and the amount of property managers that came to us during the select committee process and said "Yes there are some rogue operators out there but let's not punish the 95 percent of those hard-working property managers that are genuinely trying to provide value for both the tenant and the property owner." And so why don't we have a code of conduct for property managers? I'd like the Minister to answer that. And this code of conduct would set the standards for property managers in the sector which we currently lack. It would also outline what they can charge on to consumers in terms of the transparency and it would also outline particularly a process for becoming licensed as a property manager. And the Minister needs to explain—[Bell rung]CHAIRPERSON (Poto Williams): I call Dan Bidois.DAN BIDOIS: Thank you Madam Chair. It's fantastic to continue this discussion because I really want the Minister to respond to the issues from the select committee because I believe that the select committee submitters deserve a right to hear why this Government hasn't taken their ideas seriously.But now let's come to the bill. Now the bill in Part 1 looks at the unlawful act of charging a fee. And I have serious reservations about this part of the bill. We know that property managers incur time and effort for a letting fee. We know that because they've told us in the select committee that it takes anywhere from 12 to 20 hours to rent out a property. We also know from the select committee process that tenants benefit from the services that property managers provide.So the idea is that this is actually going to be an unlawful act when it is a free exchange in a market society where one actor in a society has a service to provide and another has a willingness to purchase that service. Why are we getting in the way of that economic relationship? And if that relationship is in fact broken down why doesn't the Minister consider ways to improve that market rather than just a straight-off ban?I do want to say that I echo the sentiment of my colleagues that have expressed a deep dissatisfaction that this bill will significantly affect long-term tenancies. Let's just say for example's sake that tenant rentals increase by a measly $2 a week by this bill. Now under supply and demand we know that that's in fact consistent with the arguments that this Government's been making which is supply and demand's been driving the market. But $2? That's not much. But $2 over a year—what does that add up to? That's $700 a year. If you were in a long-term tenancy over several years times that $700 by the amount of years that you've been there and that is the impact the unintended consequence of this bill on a whole range of long-term tenants of which I am currently one.And I just don't think that this Government has thought through the wider implications of this bill on the rental market. They should be focused on building homes and increasing the supply and I'm not talking about 18 or 20 houses. This Government promised 10000 houses a year. And what are they doing? They've just opened their first KiwiBuild home over the weekend—CHAIRPERSON (Poto Williams): Can I bring the member back to the bill please?DAN BIDOIS: —and quite frankly—Madam Chair?CHAIRPERSON (Poto Williams): Back to the bill.DAN BIDOIS: OK back to the bill. Let's get some empirical evidence. We heard during the select committee process the Scottish example that proves that rental prices are likely to rise. And even in the regulatory impact statement it says that rental prices will likely rise and that's going to affect a significant amount of tenants over time particularly long-term tenants. And I would like to hear from the Minister in respect of the concerns I have raised on behalf of those that have submitted in the select committee process about how to improve the transparency the effectiveness of the market rather than just a straight-out ban because quite frankly it looks like this Government has reached a conclusion that they want to ban no matter what for the sake of ideology rather than work to improve the regulations through a code of conduct through increasing the transparency of the market and through increasing the licensing of rogue operators to ensure that this market works effectively.So I would like the Minister to answer that and I say on behalf of those submitters that they deserve a right to an answer. Thank you."