Brownlee GerryHon GERRY BROWNLEE (National): I never thought I'd come to the House and hear the ACT Party passionately pleading for more rules to be inflicted on people in New Zealand. I've normally got quite a bit of time for Mr Court. I think he's a very intelligent man who makes great contributions. But man oh man where did that speech come from? Here we have a bill that is going to allow a whole lot more flexibility for people who want to use some of their surplus land or use a section that might be cleared for that purpose to create more houses for New Zealanders who desperately need them.Look I've heard all the talk from a lot of people who have said to me Well what about all these boxes that have been built in Christchurch?" I've got to say to Eugenie Sage go and have a look at the rules inflicted on the city by the regional council because that's what's being built at the moment under the current rules. We have a city council there of course that has had its head in the sand literally for decades not wanting to create more space for people to develop sections and I think it's got to a point after four years of absolute neglect from the Labour Party that we've had to come to this situation. So while there is certainly a bipartisan aspect to this bill no one should think that it's a willing party on all sides coming to the table. So I'm very pleased that Nicola Willis has been able to negotiate some very reasonable changes in this bill. I understand a 50-point Supplementary Order Paper is coming that will make a difference to boundary offsets will make a difference to height will make a difference to the outdoor living space and will encourage a better sort of garden-type arrangement inside these areas. I've got to say just on that score in our city of Christchurch we've got a council-owned organisation called Orion who run around the city with more chainsaws than you can shake a stick at although why you'd ever shake a stick in front of a chainsaw is beyond me. They're cutting down trees left right and centre for fear that the powerlines are going to get affected. So we've got a whole lot of things that go on from councils that just indicate a general level of incompetence and a general level of eye off the ball.Earlier in the debate the Hon David Parker made the extraordinary statement that the brightline test has done a wonderful job in containing house prices in this country. Well let's have a look at it. In the last 12 months the average house price in New Zealand's gone up by $150000. So if someone in here or anywhere in New Zealand bought a house 12 months ago and sold it today there's $150000 over and above the price they paid 12 months ago. They pay out their brightline tax and walk away with $100000 profit. It's great business if you can get it and the fact of the matter is that that is tax chasing a price.Then you look at the tax content inside a brand new house. For a start if it's $700000 there's about $120000 worth of GST and there's profit tax on every input that goes into that house as well as the PAYE for everyone who puts the thing together so the Government does exceptionally well out of these things. It's a massive tax take. Then look at new subdivisions. Now Mr Court spoke of the difficulty for one developer that's out there and some of the extraordinary prices they have to pay to the council for the privilege of providing a rating base to the council by virtue of new titles. You look at it: the costs from local government inside that new house price is extraordinary. Add up that and the Government stuff and it is a massive massive part of that $700000 to $800000 average price now for a brand new three-bedroom home somewhere in New Zealand and not a home that might have been built in the 1970s 1960s 1950s or before on a much smaller site and in a much denser arrangement.So what we have to recognise is that there is massive demand out there for new housing. New housing chases the price of existing housing and unless there are these sorts of moves made that get some of those nutty planners out of the way and get councils starting to focus on what some of their core business should be then it is absolutely essential that the Parliament takes a strong view on it. It won't please everybody—I know that—but in the end young people in this country have a right to live somewhere and have a right to some home ownership and this is one way that we can ensure that they have at least a chance at that."