Sepuloni CarmelCARMEL SEPULONI (Labour—Kelston): We are highly opposed—as you will have heard formerly from my colleagues who have spoken not just from the Labour Party but also from the Green Party and New Zealand First—to the fact that the Government has made the decision to put this bill through under urgency. We have been trying to get some urgency over the housing issue for at least the last 2 years and we have not got any urgency on things that matter including—can I just mention—the issue of homelessness where we tried to get the Government to agree to do a cross-party inquiry into this very important issue. Instead we have had to do it in partnership with the Greens and with the Māori Party because the Government did not see a need for that to be urgent. But here we are today considering something in urgency basically because Nick Smith—again—has made a shambles of the housing situation.I just want to say—and I have been yelling it out from the backbenches over here—that actually I think Nick Smith will go down in history as the worst housing Minister New Zealand has ever had. What a legacy—what a legacy for him to leave here. It is part of a string of fiascos that pass for a housing policy under the Minister and yet we still have to listen to that Government—every time those members stand up in the House—say that it has a comprehensive housing package. There is no comprehensive housing plan that the National Government has going on. The plan—the only plan—that New Zealand needs from the National Government is a commitment to building houses. We do not need a pipeline and we do not need a consent because we cannot live in a pipeline and we cannot live in a consent. We need actual houses and we have not been given them so far.Although Labour would vote for the first part which is extending the housing accords law here we think it is untenable actually to push the second part with changes to the Public Works Act through all stages under urgency. If both parts—as we have said earlier—are included in this bill then we cannot vote for this bill—and actually I think my colleague Phil Twyford did put up an amendment trying to split the bill but that has not been supported. My understanding is that it has not been supported by the National Government. So easy—we could so easily support part of this; we just cannot support the second part—it would be so easy for the Minister to just split it in two so that at least he could get some consensus in the House for part of what he is trying to do. But we cannot commit to the second part because we do believe there needs to be some public scrutiny on that particularly in respect of what we are dealing with there—that is basically changes to the way in which the Public Works Act applies.I want to talk just a little bit about where I have seen that specific part of the Public Works Act applied to my own electorate and that was with regard to the Waterview Connection. We know that as part of the Waterview Connection a whole lot of properties were purchased from Housing New Zealand as part of the Public Works Act process—and also private houses—so that that particular motorway could be built; then in the end actually a whole lot of them were not required. You know as New Zealanders we can have peace of mind that actually the first port of call in terms of offering those houses for purchase back was actually to Housing New Zealand because it had sold them as part of the Public Works Act process in the first place. Unfortunately in that situation Housing New Zealand did not purchase the houses back—it should have—Housing New Zealand acted as if there was no need to recoup that housing and then those houses ended up going up for private sale.But we know that if there was a responsible Government then that measure is actually a very sensible measure to have in place. That housing was not required for the roading project. It should have gone straight back to Housing New Zealand. Housing New Zealand had the opportunity to purchase it back. Unfortunately in that situation it did not—but I am happy that at least that safeguard was in place and I do not want it to be messed with particularly given that we have not had any time to actually scrutinise what is being proposed here by the National Government. In fact as some of my colleagues have pointed out it does not seem like National members have actually had time to scrutinise what is in front of them for themselves. In fact Nick Smith seems a little bit confused about what is actually in this bill and we are concerned actually that perhaps the way in which Nick Smith has communicated this to his Cabinet is slightly misleading. But given that this is going through under urgency we will not have the opportunity to scrutinise it to the extent that we need to.Earlier people who have been on their feet on this side of the House talked about some of the issues that we are facing in respect of housing and actually we have made it really clear that this is a priority for Labour in Opposition and Labour when we are in Government. I just want to say that it has been really disconcerting to see the response that we got from the National Government on a number of issues. Particularly let us start with the fact it denies there is a housing crisis in the first place. And then yet we get responses back from them like the one I got back from the Minister for Social Housing who states that it takes 155 days to house someone who is homeless—155 days to actually house someone who is homeless—who is living in their car living in a garage living under a bush somewhere; it takes that Government 155 days to house them.I have had difficulties even getting a definition out of the National Government in respect of what homelessness is. In fact when I asked the Minister for Social Housing what the definition for homelessness was I got a response on the day that the response was due saying that she needed more time to be able to provide that answer. More time to be able to provide a definition for homelessness? We just have to wonder what the criteria that we are working under are and whether the Government even knows what is going on. And then we hear through a University of Otago study that there are approximately 41000 - plus people who are homeless in this country and the National Government says that it does not believe that figure—Hon Dr Nick Smith: It's crap.CARMEL SEPULONI: —that that figure is not correct. Oh actually I think I just heard Nick Smith say that that figure is crap. Well actually—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! I probably should have pulled the member up but I do not want it repeated back and forth thank you.CARMEL SEPULONI: Sure. Thank you Mr Assistant Speaker. Actually we see it every day in our electorate offices particularly those of us who live in electorates that have people who are living on lower incomes. As my colleague Jenny Salesa said before it is not just those who are on benefits—although we are concerned about those people who are homeless—but there is also a growing number of working poor who cannot afford to put a roof over the heads of their family and are living in cars. That is concerning to us but what is really concerning is that it does not seem to be concerning to the National Government.This bill as I said earlier is another step in this shambles that has been the Government's housing accords. It demonstrates yet again the Government's incompetence on housing. The Government was well aware that some of the special housing areas could lose their ability to continue under the new Auckland Unitary Plan before the housing accords legislation was even passed—and yet now it is pushing through legislation with only 10 days to go before D-day. This could have been considered in a more responsible way but the Government has not thought forward it has not been organised and here we go again in the chaos that is the National Government's supposed comprehensive housing plan.The housing accords have failed to deliver new housing with only just over 1000 houses actually completed in Auckland after 3 years yet the Government now proposes to extend them for another 3 years. They have also been a goldmine for land bankers—I think my colleague Marama Davidson was talking about this before—with only 57 of the 154 special housing areas actually having building consents in them so far. If the Government was serious about delivering more housing it would actually adopt Labour's KiwiBuild plan to build—Hon Dr Nick Smith: It's a joke—it's a joke.CARMEL SEPULONI: —100000 affordable houses. It is not a joke when a political party has a plan to build more houses in the midst of a housing crisis Nick Smith. That is not the joke. The joke is that that Minister refuses to listen and acknowledge that there is a housing crisis in this country. That is the joke. The joke is that that Minister has brought the bill to the House under urgency because he was not organised enough to get this through the proper channels earlier on when he should have. That is the joke Mr Smith.