Turei Metiria: Oral Questions — Questions to MinistersText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeTurei Metiria: Oral Questions — Questions to Ministers[Sitting date: 03 March 2016. Volume:711;Page:9371. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]3.METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green) to the Minister for Building and Housing: Does he stand by all his answers to Oral Question No. 1 in the House yesterday?Hon Dr NICK SMITH (Minister for Building and Housing): Yes particularly my answer pointing out how the Government’s insulation and smoke alarm requirements will save 21 lives a year and the fact that our Government has invested $500 million in making our homes warmer drier and safer—16 times what the previous Government spent.Metiria Turei: Is it not a fact that he misled the House yesterday when he claimed that 18 lives would be saved through the Residential Tenancies Amendment Bill when in fact the evidence is those lives would be saved by a much higher standard of insulation and a range of other safety measures including a heating device?Hon Dr NICK SMITH: I stand by the numbers yesterday. They are provided in an economic analysis research report in which it said “The health-related benefits arise primarily from the retrofitting of insulation … A reduction in mortality was the largest benefit—preventing 18 deaths per year …”. That is a report that was commissioned independently from my ministry and I stand by it.Metiria Turei: I seek leave to table two reports that show the connection between the 18 deaths and a higher standard of—Mr SPEAKER: Order! We need just the title of the reports and the dates.Metiria Turei: The first of those reports is the Cost Benefit Analysis for a Minimum Standard for Rental Housingfrom November 2014.Mr SPEAKER: And the second?Metiria Turei: The second report is The Impact of Retrofitted Insulation and New Heaters on Health Services Utilisation and Costs Pharmaceutical Costs and Mortality from October 2011.Mr SPEAKER: And I just want confirmation that they are not readily available for members if they want them.Metiria Turei: I found them on the internet; they could be publicly available.Mr SPEAKER: If they are publicly available then members can source them for themselves.Dr Parmjeet Parmar: Why does the Government not support the housing warrant of fitness bill proposed by the member?Hon Dr NICK SMITH: The Government is not supporting the bill because it goes too far; it is impractical. It would make it an unlawful act to rent or use a property that does not have glass visibility strips and security stays on all windows. I know my own private home in Nelson does not comply; I suspect the houses of most members of this House would not comply. I do find it ironic that the Greens would compel glass visibility strips on the windows of all other people’s buildings but actually do not even have them in Bowen House. It is that classic policy from the Greens—Mr SPEAKER: Order! We do not need that part to the answer.Hon Dr NICK SMITH: I seek leave of the House to have a photo of—Mr SPEAKER: Order! That is not—[Interruption]Order! The Minister will resume his seat if he wishes to stay to answer the balance of the questions. I remind Dr Nick Smith that when I rise to my feet and call for order that is the time for him to resume his seat. I do not want to have to remind him of that again.Metiria Turei: Is the Minister saying that it is silly and petty to have glass visibility strips on windows and doors in rental homes when ACC reports that 133 children are injured by either falling through a closed glass window or out of a window every week in this country; more than 500 children a month injured?Hon Dr NICK SMITH: If that member truly believed that glass visibility strips should be on all windows I simply challenge her why she does not have them in her own office? If the member really believed that was a practical requirement to impose on every building owner in New Zealand she could start by setting a good example.Metiria Turei: Will the Minister apologise to this House for misleading New Zealanders by claiming that 18 lives would be saved by his bill when all of the evidence that he has referred to and has been tabled in the House shows that those 18 lives would be saved only by a much higher standard of insulation and a clean-heating device than what is required in his bill?Hon Dr NICK SMITH: No because the member is wrong. I can quote directly from the analysis. It says: “The health-related benefits arise primarily from the retrofitting of insulation …”. It goes on to quote the reduction in mortality that would occur the benefits of hospitalisation and the reduction in pharmaceutical costs. They are exactly the things the Government is doing. What we are not going to do is to have a pedantic warrant of fitness that will impose costs of administration alone of over $100 million and which actually most members of this Parliament’s own private homes would not comply with.Metiria Turei: Does his advice not go on to say that the research on those 18 lives is based on an insulation standard as at 2008—a much higher standard than the miserable 1978 standard in his bill? Why will he not tell the whole story?Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Because the member misunderstands both the bill and the regulations that the Government has put forward. New Zealand did not require insulation in homes that were newly constructed until 1978. What our bill and regulations require is that if a home has no insulation you will be required to install insulation as per the current standards.Metiria Turei: 1978.Hon Dr NICK SMITH: No the current standards—that is very clear in the regulations. What the Government is not going to do is to have someone who put insulation in their house in 2010 now having to rip it out and put stuff in that meets the current standard. It is exactly the sort of approach that we would take in for instance an area with earthquake-prone buildings where there is a different standard for those buildings that are new but that does not necessarily mean it makes sense to require absolutely every building in New Zealand to meet new building standards.Metiria Turei: Is it not also the case that the Grimes report the Minister tabled on Tuesday said that with a higher standard of insulation and a heating device older New Zealanders with respiratory illness would gain an additional 4 years of life through those two measures—neither of which are in his bill?Hon Dr NICK SMITH: I would firstly draw the member’s attention to the existing housing regulations that make reference to the requirements around heating devices. The second is simply this—Metiria Turei: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I did specifically refer to the Grimes report—Mr SPEAKER: Order! I heard the question. What we need to do is allow the Minister the courtesy to respond to the question. If the Minister then does not answer the question let us have a look at the matter then but at least allow the Minister to get more than 10 or 12 words out before we can address whether he has addressed the question or not.Hon Dr NICK SMITH: And the bit the member does not seem to understand is that if we imposed a requirement on every landlord in New Zealand to provide a new heat pump today that is a cost that you impose on the sector that would ultimately be passed on in rents. There are not free goods when you have a regulatory cost that is passed on and that is the part that the member seems to be ignorant of.Metiria Turei: Point of order—Mr SPEAKER: Order! I am just going to invite the member to repeat the question because I know what the point of order will be. Would the member please repeat the question for the benefit of the Minister.Metiria Turei: Is it not true that the Grimes report which the Minister tabled in the House on Tuesday said that with a higher standard of insulation and a heating device older New Zealanders with respiratory illness would gain an additional 4 years of life based on those measures—neither of which are in his bill?Hon Dr NICK SMITH: First the member is mistaken. The report that I tabled from Mr Arthur Grimes earlier in the week was solely on the issue of home insulation not on the issue of heating and in that respect the member is incorrect.Metiria Turei: Why is the Minister making up numbers and misrepresenting the research to show his bill does better than it will when all he needs to do is improve the standard of insulation in the bill to make sure that New Zealanders’ lives will genuinely be saved through this measure?Hon Dr NICK SMITH: The confusion of the member is confirmed by that very question in that the bill does not set the level of regulation that is in the bill. That is set in the regulations and the regulations make plain that for new insulation being installed it needs to meet the modern standard but that it would be unreasonable for someone who has an insulation standard that was built in the 1990s to have to rip that out to meet some sort of pedantic requirement for which the Greens unreasonably would impose costs on the sector. Those costs are ultimately passed on in rents and hurt the very people whom we were attempting to help.