Turei Metiria: Housing Amendment Bill Housing Corporation (Social Housing Reform) Amendment Bill (No 2) Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters (Social Housing Reform) Amendment Bill (NO 2) — Third ReadingsText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeTurei Metiria: Housing Amendment Bill Housing Corporation (Social Housing Reform) Amendment Bill (No 2) Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters (Social Housing Reform) Amendment Bill (NO 2) — Third Readings[Sitting date: 18 February 2016. Volume:711;Page:9182. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green): The suburbs of this country were built by the State at a time when housing in New Zealand was at an all-time low—this was in the 1930s—and when people were living in slums. The Government of the time—the first Labour Government if I remember rightly—committed to ensuring that all New Zealanders every New Zealand family would have access to a decent home because having a decent home is critical to a family being able to stay well and be well to them having stable work and to having a well-functioning orderly society where we know that everybody is doing well. That is what housing provides—that security and stability for everyone.Over the last 10 years in particular we have seen a radical revision and erosion of that principle—an erosion of the principle that housing is a right and that the Government has an explicit and very important role in helping to provide stable secure housing for New Zealanders.What we have seen is that the Government has allowed the private market to take control and as a result of the private market having total control over housing provision we have seen not only increasing amounts of homelessness but also a massive increase in the cost of housing.This is to the point where there are thousands of older people who have children who are in their early 20s—a bit like my situation actually. I will put myself in this category. I do have a child in her early 20s who is looking to have a family and to settle down who has absolutely no opportunity—her or her partner—to buy a decent home in which they can start their life. No opportunity at all because they have been locked out of housing.These are the families. They are perfectly ordinary families like yours and mine. They are not just those at the very bottom but perfectly ordinary middle-class families who are locked out of housing because this Government has not ensured that the housing supply has continued at a rate that means that everybody has the same opportunity for security and stability in housing that we and our parents had. Do not forget that our parents built the security of their lives—often through Māori Affairs home loans; through the cheap borrowing that was possible—through the State housing system which was designed to provide for the middle and working class just as it was for those at the very bottom.We have lost the value of housing as a human right as critical infrastructure and as the right of our children to a secure life. This legislation erodes that even more by making two Ministers of the Crown the private landlords effectively for 60000 tenants in this country. There are 60000 families nowrenting essentiallyfrom two Ministers. This legislation allows the Ministers to sell those homes those State houses built by our parents and grandparents for our children to anyone they choose—anyone at all. There is no obligation that those State houses stay for State housing purposes for the people who need it most—no obligation. These Ministers can sell to any corporate entity anywhere in the world—to any major international corporation—which may not have any involvement in New Zealand may not understand the New Zealand community and has no commitment to making sure that housing remains for the security of our families for the time to come.This is what this legislation does.It is the absolute end of the process of the erosion of housing for New Zealanders.We hear a lot of rhetoric so let us be really clear here: middle-class working New Zealanders have been locked out of the housing market by this Government. Those at the very bottom end who need help the most have no security in their homes now and we will see the privatisation—the selling off—of one of the major assets that our grandparents and parents built for us and for our children. This legislation should not proceed. Thank you.