Salesa JennyPOINT ENGLAND DEVELOPMENT ENABLING BILLFirst ReadingDebate resumed.JENNY SALESA (Labour—Manukau East): Kia ora tātou katoa e Te Whare Pāremata. Thank you for this opportunity to take this call on the Point England Development Enabling Bill. Labour is dedicated to ensuring that our families have safe warm affordable homes. It is a base—having a house that is—from which families can build and ensure that their children are safe. In Government Labour is committed to building thousands of affordable houses for our whānau for our children and tamariki and for Aotearoa New Zealand.Labour is supportive of this bill to the select committee because particularly in Auckland we know that we are facing a housing crisis a housing crisis that has been blown up under the watch of this Government and a housing crisis that is spreading across the country like a virus unfortunately at this time. This bill has been designed to enable housing development on 11.69 hectares of land within the Point England recreational reserve of the Tāmaki estuary. This reserve is owned by the Crown; however it has long been held and vested in Auckland Council as a recreational reserve. It is land that is zoned as a public open space. The area includes sports fields it includes a walkway and it also includes recreational facilities. However a portion of this reserve near the CBD and major infrastructure in Auckland is underutilised right now. In fact it is currently fenced off as grazing land for cattle. The bill that is being proposed which we have before us will allow a range of houses to be built on that prime land with the balance remaining as a recreational reserve providing public spaces for this area which we know is facing considerable intensification in both the short term as well as the medium term.With regard to local government the development on this particular land will mean a loss of green space for the community. The call from the incoming mayor His Worship Phil Goff as well as from councillors and from the chair of the local board is that all proceeds from the sale of this piece of land should be reinvested in new and improved public open spaces for the local community. Given the expected growth for this area the desirable facilities and the social infrastructure that will be needed for our future generations this is a call that I fully support.With regard to the local iwi Ngāti Paoa this proposed development is a great opportunity for Ngāti Paoa as a developer of houses on their land. They have the right to purchase and develop this land for housing under the right of first refusal and Ngāti Paoa already has an agreement with the Tāmaki Redevelopment Company to build houses on this 11.69 hectare site. It is indeed fantastic to see that at least some of the historic wrongs will be addressed through the right to build houses on this land by the local iwi. They will also be providing 2 hectares of the land to develop a marae. It is at least a step in the right direction. I would like to acknowledge the aspiration that Ngāti Paoa have for their grandchildren and for the return of their ancestral lands and I wish them well in the future.When it comes to affordability however we know that in Auckland especially affordability is something that is debatable right now. The average price of a house in Auckland is over a million dollars. One of the criteria under the special housing accord is that affordable houses should sell in Auckland for no more than 75 percent of the Auckland region's median house price. But that median house price was close to $900000 as of October. It is a 5 percent increase on the previous month. As we saw in the New Zealand Herald's coverage yesterday in terms of Auckland's housing affordability: To get a KiwiSaver first home grant on a property (up to $5000 for an individual or up to $10000 for two or more buyers) it must be priced under $600000 up from $550000 in August. But the latest QV estimated median values show this increase has done little to make even houses in the cheapest areas within reach of many first home buyers." Bernard Hickey in the New Zealand Herald yesterday is quoted as saying: "Across the rest of the country house prices continue to hit new highs." There is also the other issue which is an effect of housing being so unaffordable in Auckland: homelessness. We know that there are at least 41000 people who are homeless. Thousands of them are homeless living in cars garages and other places in Auckland. Although this bill is worthy for several reasons it is only going to enable the development of 300 homes. The sad reality that we see in Auckland is that it needs to build thousands of homes new homes to be able to house the demand that we see in that city. The basic truth that we know is that too many of our people are locked out of homeownership.There is also another issue: the issue of a skills gap. We know that the major providers in construction and infrastructure got together with Auckland Council way back in 2013. They wrote a detailed report and they presented it to the Cabinet Minister of the time the Hon Steven Joyce basically setting out that in Auckland alone they are going to be short by at least 32000 skilled people just in construction and infrastructure. Before we can rebuild our own houses including in Auckland we would need skilled people.I believe that there is only one party that has a comprehensive housing proposal that will deal with Auckland's housing crisis and that is the Labour Party. We look forward to the day when we will come into Government and we will be able to implement our comprehensive housing policy. Thank you so much."