Twyford PhilHon PHIL TWYFORD (Minister for Urban Development): Thank you Madam Chair. Let me just respond to some of those points raised by the Hon David Clark who asked about whether or not the Government policy statement will have a level of agility and flexibility attached to it and what kind of engagement has been had with developers in crafting the provisions in Part 2. And secondly clause 29(2)(b) the question about whether an amendment is significant or not and therefore would need to be consulted.It's probably worthwhile for this discussion just to kind of step back a second and just remind members and anyone listening to this that there are two main things that we're asking Kāinga Ora—Homes and Communities to do. There are two main functions that the organisation will have—I should say three actually. The first is that it will be the home of public housing so it is the new organisation that will inherit this great 100-year legacy in New Zealand of public housing; of the Government acting—when the market fails—to build and own and rent quality housing for people who would otherwise struggle to in the market.The second is that we are building in Kāinga Ora—Homes and Communities the capacity to deliver the Government build programme. Our Government shares an ambition that many Governments have had in the past in New Zealand and that is to ensure that alongside the private sector we're using the levers available for the State to ensure that there is an adequate supply of the kind of quality housing that people want in places where they need it. And that's why we're amalgamating HLC—the people who brought us Hobsonville Point—with the KiwiBuild procurement team and the construction and development element that currently exists within Housing New Zealand.Those three functions are being merged together to create one powerful entity to drive the Government build programme that includes public housing emergency housing affordable housing partnering with community housing providers the building of KiwiBuild affordable homes and the market homes that will sit alongside all those different kinds of homes and tenures in large-scale development projects. The third key function is the ability in the special powers that will follow in the second bill after this to undertake large-scale urban development projects: so the likes of a Hobsonville a Tāmaki. The member David Clark referred to South Dunedin which I want to talk a little bit about because there is a really interesting example. In fact over the last several years as we've been discussing this policy and developing it we've often talked about South Dunedin as a place that would benefit from precisely this kind of mechanism that we're setting up here: a public agency that has access to all of the powers that local government currently has of land-use regulation network infrastructure transport the three waters parks and reserves amalgamating land titles financing raising revenue to support investment—to do all of these things and to be a joint venture vehicle through which Government and central government could and even private investors and iwi could be part of it tackle some of the more complex and challenging land-use issues of our time. Now South Dunedin is a community that is desperately in need of an upgrade to its housing stock and its infrastructure and faces some real challenges environmental challenges caused by very low lying land and the threats posed by rising sea levels. South Dunedin is one place that could really benefit from this kind of approach. The member asked: would this legislation and would Kāinga Ora have through its Government policy statement (GPS) the kind of agility and the flexibility to respond to things that might happen like the floods that happened in Dunedin that might spark for instance a local authority to say We need to act. We need to do something about this." I guess the best response I can give is that when I look at the transport GPS it does provide that flexibility. It sets out high-level goals. It actually sets out activity classes—so spending bands for a three-year programme with a range of spending possibilities against different activity classes in the transport budget. But it gives the Crown agent—in this case Kāinga Ora; in that case the New Zealand Transport Agency—the flexibility to operate within those bands. It sets out the policy goals the priorities the analysis that underpins the strategy but it empowers—Andrew Bayly: This is marvellous.Hon PHIL TWYFORD: I'm glad the member agrees.Andrew Bayly: We just hope you will have the opportunity for other Ministers to speak because we need them all down in the House tonight.Hon PHIL TWYFORD: I'm glad the member agrees. It gives the Crown agency the ability to operate within those parameters so I think it does in fact provide plenty of flexibility and agility. David Clark asked whether there'd been any engagement with developers and in fact there has been—in fact in the lead-up to the drafting of the legislation a lot of dialogue with the developers in the private sector. And in the oral submissions at select committee both the Property Council and Infrastructure New Zealand the lobby group that represents the private sector infrastructure industry supported at the committee a GPS with a long-term vision that is more than 10 years. And as the member alluded I think a lot of that has to do with their desire to see a long-term pipeline of work and some stability and consensus. One of the benefits of the GPS and having a Crown agent that exercises some autonomy at arm's length to a degree from the day-to-day accountability to the Minister is the desire to try to take some of the politics out of it to build consensus and public support around the long-term strategy and to a degree that's also part of the strategy here. My sense is that the GPS will actually set some of the priorities. An example might be: what kind of large-scale projects should Kāinga Ora focus on? So there are a number of choices here. We could focus on greenfield projects on the edge of town: some projects in places like Hamilton in places like Rotokauri North. In places like Tauranga it could be Te Tumu and Tauriko West. Or the GPS for example might say "We think the priority is to do urban intensification projects in the urban half of the city." which is what this organisation is tooled up to do. So all those things are possible. It's also the case that the special powers that will follow in the next bill will allow not just residential projects but actually urban development or regeneration: for instance shifting a port something that's very dear to the heart of our colleagues in New Zealand First; or reworking an old industrial area to build a stadium or some new kind of economic activity. So I think there's plenty of flexibility within the GPS to both set direction but also leave Kāinga Ora and all of the other organisations in the sector the ability to respond to day-to-day events.Finally David Clark asked about clause 29(2)(b) and my understanding and my advice is that all that that provision means is that if there is a change that is minor and technical in nature no consultation is required. And so the test there is whether it's anything more than minor and technical and if it is significant then it would require consultation."