Brownlee GerryHon GERRY BROWNLEE (National): We are this afternoon debating the Address in Reply. That is the reply from the Parliament to the address read by the Governor-General on the formation of the last Government. It is effectively the Government's address to the nation about its intentions for the three years to come. And it can only be described as the most vacuous document that's ever been put toward the people of New Zealand by a Government that has the sort of majority mandate that we see from the current Government. What that indicates I think is a degree of timidness a degree of uncertainty and a degree of simply not knowing which way to head in these turbulent times. So I want to this afternoon acknowledge that there has been a good response from New Zealand in the fight against COVID-19—no question about that. We have been as a nation very good at setting aside some of the civil liberties that we might otherwise want to have protected in order to see the benefit for the wider community. That's a good thing. That is now bedded in and we have a process for making sure that this pandemic does not afflict New Zealand to any greater extent than it already has. There will be occasions when things go wrong and we will point those occasions out and we notice that when we have the Government has been very quick to patch things up as much as possible recognising the difficult circumstances that we're facing. But COVID-19 cannot mask some of the very big problems that this country still has. It cannot mask some of the very big problems that exist internationally across the rest of the world and in our relationships with the rest of the world. And above all it should not be the excuse that a Government daily uses for not getting on with the business of dealing with the things that make life better for New Zealanders. So let's just look at a couple of things that are particularly troublesome at the moment.The first is the hardy annual of crime which is very much on the rise. Has there ever been a Government in this country that has so passively watched the increase in the gang activities across the nation than this current Government? Has there ever been a Government that has been almost apologetic for the large increases in gang activity across the country? And has there ever been a Government that has all but instructed the police to no longer prosecute for drug offences in this country? It is laying out the ground for that gang activity to become even greater than it is at the moment and for the complete disregard for the order of communities that those lawless gangs inflict on people. That is a huge abdication of responsibility by the current Government.A simple question: where was there a statement in the Speech from the Throne about why the Government has cancelled police intakes for the time being? What's happened to the idea that we're going to increase the presence of police in our communities something that was so important during the last three years of the Government but now is just gone? Completely gone—utter silence.And then we come to the issue of housing. Well I tell you what: I've never heard such hot air and wind talked about this topic as we've heard just in the two days that this Parliament has listened to question time. We just heard the Hon David Parker talking about the need to sort the problem out with some Resource Management Act (RMA) changes. Well his process outlined this morning will not see a completed bill in this House in this term. There is no way that the process that he's laid out is going to lead to anything that will speed up the opportunity for more land to be available for housing for better rules around housing to be put in place by local government or for there to be any downward pressure on the price of housing in this country.We heard in one question going to the Prime Minister that the effect of the brightline test has simply been to put the price of houses up—$120000 is the average price increase in the last 12 months. So if someone's a speculator and they buy a house and they make their $120000 profit on it they pay $50000 in tax and the rest is profit. So it's certainly not a deterrent as long as there is that constraint on supply. And there is the unwillingness of the current Government to recognise that it is supply that always determines price. And then we have the issue of assistance that's given to people to get into new homes. They talk a big game mention all the schemes that are out there but fail to tell the country that almost 20 percent of the price of a new home is taken in tax and that's before you consider any income tax paid by the various trades that put inputs into that cost.So if the Government has got its hand out to that extent why wouldn't the price of a house continue to go up? And let's be clear: that price drives the price of existing homes and in areas where they are closer in to the city it just exacerbates that upward price pressure. So we have a Government that talks a big game about housing but has absolutely no concept of how that market works and I don't in any way ashamedly use that word because that's what it is and that's what we're seeing.Now I find it fascinating too that David Parker suddenly has some kind of epiphany about the need to change the RMA and then he goes on to say Oh it's enormously complex." Well go back to the first principle of it which was that if you are able to mitigate against the worst effects on the environment then you could do what you wanted. And if that was the starting point we might end up with some legislation that actually let people move forward.But I also want to say: have a look at what was done in Christchurch post the earthquakes. Eight-and-a-half-thousand families found out that they could no longer live on the sections that their houses were built on—the land would not sustain ongoing building. So there was an immediate need to create new space and a lot of it. And what we discovered is the three local councils down there have been for 15 years arguing over an urban development strategy. They'd gotten as far as the Environment Court and the Environment Court said "Oh well if we hurry things up we might get it done in another couple of years." Well we took the step of saying that wasn't good enough and effectively used the special legislation available to consent land for up to 43000 sections in Christchurch. It was done very very quickly. And what has the effect of that been? It's meant that there has been some price containment better than anywhere else in the country on the cost of housing. But of course that will always relate to the rest of the country. The point is that it's possible for Governments to do something a heck of a lot faster than this crowd are currently showing signs of wanting to do.I will bet that there are urban development strategies stuck in councils from one end of the country to the other not making any progress because of the hog-tie that's around them from the RMA. So why not be bold and say "Then we'll have a fast arrangement."? David Parker talks about the arrangements he put in place for consenting big projects and he's saying no one in here is very happy with it. We are happy with it. The only person who's not happy with it is him because of the advice he's getting from his officials which is "Please don't disturb our little fortress here. We're very important and we're very very keen on stopping almost anything." He needs to get over the top of that. He needs to get bold and he needs to get legislation into the House that consents a whole lot of land for new building. And then they need to look at the Government's inputs into it. How much of that new house price is development levy? How much of it is contributions to reserves? How much are all these things? I see the Green Party there saying "Oh that's great. You've got to have it." Well they get a rating base. They get an enormous rating base out of those new houses and so they have a big big forward income but they want that cash just to spend it on other junky things that they seem to like. [Interruption] Stand up and take a speech. We'd love to hear from you. We would love to hear from that member. It won't be anything worth listening to but I still think it would be worth her saying something.Angie Warren-Clark: So mean.Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: No—you're right. That's far too mean. I do apologise. We live in a time when we're supposed to be kind to one another and you're basically a friend of mine so I take that back. Can I just finish by saying: if you've got a big majority use it."