Parker David: Resource Management Reform Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeParker David: Resource Management Reform Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 27 August 2013. Volume:693;Page:12834. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour): I want to follow up on some comments that Phil Twyford made in respect of Part 2 of the Resource Management Reform Bill—Hon Maurice Williamson: Just to correct them.Hon DAVID PARKER: I will not respond to that interjection. This bill gives form to the way in which the new Auckland Unitary Plan is going to be brought into final effect. As Phil Twyford has said one of the problems that the Government has caused for itself through an earlier stage in the Resource Management Act reforms was that until it passed one of its earlier so-called reform bills new plans had transitional effect from the date of notification; therefore they had legal weight even before they became fully operative. The Government thought that that introduced unnecessary complexity and said that it needed to have more simplicity and so it said that proposed plans did not have any transitional effect even after notification. Of course the folly of that is shown by what is needed to be done now in respect of the other bill that is introducing and giving effect to parts of the Auckland Unitary Plan outside of the Resource Management Reform Bill.But I just want to make another observation as to why that is an inadequate response. I am sure a number of members in addition to me were at a lecture sponsored by Auckland University with Harvard Professor EdwardGlaeser who was in town recently. He was asked the question as to whether land supply was important in respect of growing cities in order to moderate the cost of housing and he agreed that it was. Everyone agrees that. There is actually no one I am aware of who denies the proposition that land supply is not an important ingredient. Indeed the Labour Party has been on record in respect of that position for a long time. In fact we were calling for the new Auckland Unitary Plan to be given effect before the Government belatedly agreed to do so. But the problem with what the Government is doing in respect of land supply alone is that as ProfessorGlaeser said more important than issues around land supply at the margin of the city are rules that limit intensification of land use within the existing city boundary.The problem that the Minister in the chair the Minister for the Environment has—and I would like her to respond to this point. I want her to admit that during the period prior to Auckland Unitary Plan becoming operative none of the provisions relating to intensification of land use within the city boundary will have any legal weight. That is my understanding of the effect of this Resource Management Reform Bill and it is also my understanding of the companion bill in respect of the Auckland land supply issues the Housing Accords and Special Housing Areas Bill. None of it deals with the more important issue—according to the Auckland Council and ProfessorGlaeser confirmed this—that most of the increases in housing stock in Auckland will come about through more intensive use of the land that is already serviced with telecommunications roads public transport sewerage car parking and electricity. Those areas of intensification within the urban limit of Auckland are predicted to be the predominant source of new houses new apartments and new flats. They are going to be within the existing boundary of the Auckland Unitary Plan. Even after the Government—if it does—passes its Housing Accords and Special Housing Areas Bill most of the new supply of housing is going to come from within the boundary and that relies upon changes that are in the new Auckland Unitary Plan that aid the intensification of land use.Rules such as where there is an existing house that might have a basement or an attic area that is quite suitable for having a flat put into it—the planning rules around building a flat under a house within the existing exterior boundaries of the house—arecurrently quite complex. There are quite long and arduous routes for applicants if neighbours object. The plan rules are not facilitative of those sorts of intensification of land use and the Auckland Unitary Plan fixes that. But because of the inadequacy of this Government both in respect of its refusal to assist Auckland in implementing those parts of its plan and because of its prior amendments to the Resource Management Act those parts of the new Auckland Unitary Plan are of no legal effect for years—for years.So despite the fact that the Government knows that from the advice from the council from the advice from its own officials I expect and from the advice from world experts like ProfessorGlaeser all saying that intensification within city boundaries is more important than the admittedly necessary extensions to the city boundary in respect of greenfield land supply and despite the fact that the council knows that that is more important it is not fixing it. So that is one of the reasons why house price inflation in Auckland is double digit and why we have got deposit requirements being required by the Reserve Bank in excess of 20 percent for most first-home buyers. It is because of its concern at the inflation in the Auckland house market putting at risk the financial stability of the banking system and its effects on the wider economy. We have all of these flow-on effects because the Government has not been doing its job for 5 years in respect of resource management and the Auckland plans around housing.I want the Minister in the chair to take a call. If I have got it wrong and the rules relating to intensification of land use in the Auckland Unitary Plan are being advanced through this legislation like the rules are in other legislation in respect of special housing areas then take a call Minister and tell me that I have got it wrong. But my understanding is that the intensification of land use is not facilitated by this. Indeed we still do not have any of those rules having any legal effect until the new Auckland Unitary Plan becomes fully operative to be contrasted with where it was before the Government mucked it up with its last Resource Management Act changes.