Ngaro Alfred: Oral Questions — Questions to MinistersText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeNgaro Alfred: Oral Questions — Questions to Ministers[Sitting date: 02 June 2015. Volume:706;Page:4167. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]8.ALFRED NGARO (National)to the Minister for Building and Housing: What response has he received from Auckland Council and housing companies to the Auckland Crown land programme launched on Friday?Hon Dr NICK SMITH (Minister for Building and Housing):There was a very positive response to the initiative and to the first four sites—the 30 hectares in Manukau Avondale Massey East and also to the west of our Hobsonville development. I welcome the undertaking from the Auckland Council in committing its housing project office to ensure that we achieve pace and I also note that the council announced a similar initiative where it has surplus land with capacity for nearly 3000 homes. It was also very encouraging to have over 250 development companies at the launch—more than double what my officials expected. I am confident that we will have our first development agreement in place by October.Alfred Ngaro: What initiatives prior to this programme did the Government have under way on Crown land for housing in Auckland?Hon Dr NICK SMITH: We already have four such initiatives under way. There is the very successful development at Weymouth involving 282 homes. This was where the Auckland Housing Accord was signed and the first special housing area was launched. This is land that has sat vacant for every one of the 9 years that the previous Government was in office. I am advised the programme is running 3 months ahead of schedule. There is the very substantive development at Hobsonville involving 3000 homes—400 of those have been completed 150 are under construction and 500 are being consented. It is now moving at such pace that all of the properties are being sold off the plans. There is a further project at Papakura on former Defence Force land which involves 600 homes that are currently being built and of course there is the development at Tāmaki where we already have 446 homes completed and another 190 are under construction. Across these four initiatives we have over 12000 new homes being built on public land across Auckland.Alfred Ngaro: What reports has he received on the latest building consent figures for Auckland for the month of April and for the latest year and how do they compare historically?Hon Dr NICK SMITH: There was a very positive figure of 912 homes consented in Auckland in the month of April. I compare that with the last month of the previous Government where it was fewer than 200 for the month. The number for the year was 8155. That is more than double what it was 3 years ago. So we have doubled the house-building rate. I would also draw to the attention of the House that that 8000-plus figure is the strongest rate of house building in Auckland—[Interruption]Mr SPEAKER: Order! Would the Minister resume his seat.Hon David Parker: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. Once again it was a very long answer and if I could also raise a related point. When the Opposition has even two easily answerable legs to a supplementary question we only ever get one answer. And yet you allow Ministers of this Government to give five or six answers to multi-pronged supplementary questions from the Government.Mr SPEAKER: The member is raising a reasonable point on this occasion. The answer to the previous supplementary question was unnecessarily long and I brought it to an end. This answer too has gone on for too long. The reason I was not responding was that there was a large level of interjection on the question which does not help me bring the answer to a conclusion. The question has been answered at length.Rt Hon Winston Peters: Does the Minister not understand that the 9000 consents about which he boasts do not even cover the housing needs of those immigrants flooding into Auckland at the rate of about 34000 to 35000 every year?Hon Dr NICK SMITH: There has actually been very little change in the number of new immigrants arriving in Auckland. What has changed is that we do not have 30000 people a year leaving for Australia. Members on this side of the House welcome the fact that Kiwis have got confidence in New Zealand and they are coming home. It does raise extra challenges for us around housing but we are up to that challenge.