Twyford Phil: Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeTwyford Phil: Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading[Sitting date: 17 November 2015. Volume:710;Page:8270. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū): It would be nice in this stage of the bill’s progress through the House to be reporting back on select committee deliberations. It would be nice to be sharing the advice of officials. It would be nice to be reflecting on public submissions. But sadly we are not going to have that opportunity tonight and it is an irony as Phil Goff said that the passage of this bill through the House which is about ensuring proper public participation in the planning process for Auckland is being—Ron Mark: You stole my line.PHIL TWYFORD: And Ron Mark said it as well I think—or he is going to. It is an irony that this process denies people the right to have a say. It denies this bill the scrutiny that it deserves at select committee. It is a bill that is about public participation in the planning process. It is a bill that is at least in part about fixing the defects of another bill that was earlier pushed through under urgency. The National Government never seems to learn the lessons from its mistakes. My colleague Su’a William Sio pointed out that so much of the Auckland legislation that was put in place to establish the super-city was pushed through under urgency and so much time has been spent cleaning up the messes that were made by the rushed and chaotic processes around that law.Why is the unitary plan so important to Auckland’s future? Well it makes the critical zoning decisions. It includes the rules on the urban growth boundary and the introduction of new land into the supply and all of the rules on height and density that will have such a critical impact on the pipeline of new construction—new urban development and particularly housing. Given the importance of development in housing supply to fixing what the rest of the country has come to think of as the “Auckland plan” it is critical that the unitary plan is of high quality and that it is signed off in a timely way. What I think is interesting is that the critical outcomes of the bill that will make a difference to the supply of new land and housing in Auckland are the rules about the urban growth boundary and about height and density.While the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel has been beavering away hearing public submissions and deliberating on those two essential points it is worth noting I think that the National Government’s views about density have been evolving and have been moving. I thought one of the most odd chapters in this whole process was the then Minister for the Environment Amy Adams actually sitting up at night writing a huge submission as the environment Minister to the hearings panel on the Auckland Unitary Plan because the Government recognises that getting it right in Auckland is not just of critical importance to the people in those neighbourhoods where particular zoning decisions or consenting decisions are made; it is actually of national importance. If we do not improve the responsiveness of the housing market in Auckland to demand and if we do not build more affordable housing and the kinds of the types of housing that people want in places where they want to live then we will never ever fix the Auckland problem.But the great urbanists of the National Party Bill English and Nick Smith spent years during the tenure of this Government railing against the compact city and basically saying that unrestricted sprawl—getting rid of the urban growth boundary—was the only way that Auckland could move forward. That was their view and I have heard them say it in this House a dozen times if I have heard it once. But to be fair they have moved—they have moved. I think it is probably the work of the Productivity Commission and it is talking to people like the Property Council that has made them realise that good cities must have an element of density otherwise they will never produce affordable housing and they will never produce a livable environment that people actually want to live in.National has moved so far that earlier this year the Prime Minister issued an edict and said that Aucklanders must get used to living in apartments. I do not know whether the prime ministerial memo has been sent out to the National Party apparatchiks on the Ōrākei Local Board and in the leafy neighbourhoods of Kohimārama Epsom and Parnell that the Prime Minister wants to build apartments. Not apartments in Hawaii not apartments in London or maybe in St Stephens Avenue Parnell but I do not know whether the good people of Remuera and of Epsom—certainly David Seymour is not happy about the idea of apartments and density in Epsom. I do not know whether those good people have received the memo from the Prime Minister that he wants to build high-rise apartments in their neighbourhoods. I think that if he gets his way they are not going to have much of a say in that process.This new-found enthusiasm for intensification has recently seen National Party acolytes on Auckland Council enthusing over an expensive study by Ernst and Young and Cameron Partners advocating a multibillion-dollar sell-off of Auckland Council’s assets including building houses on the Remuera and Takapuna golf courses. So I look forward to the good citizens of Takapuna and Remuera—Hon Phil Goff: What do the local members say about that?PHIL TWYFORD: Ha ha! I want to know what the local National Party acolytes in Remuera and Takapuna think about their own people advocating building houses on the Remuera and Takapuna golf courses because I think that I would like to be a fly on the wall when that particular discussion is had.Nick Smith the Minister for Building and Housing justified in talking publicly about the introduction of this bill that it was very important that this legislation was passed quickly before Christmas not only so that the unitary plan recommendations could be made back to Auckland Council before the deadline but because he was worried that otherwise it would not be passed and completed in time for next year’s council elections—I think that is probably a good idea—and he also tied it to the expiry of the housing accords legislation.In a way he is quite right that the unitary plan will have a major impact on fixing the Auckland housing crisis. There is no doubt about that but as Phil Goff pointed out earlier this evening it is a very long bow to suggest that the expiry of the housing accords legislation will have any impact at all because the legislation itself has not had any impact. As the New Zealand Herald reported recently only 102 houses have been built in the 96 special housing areas established over the last 2 years under this Government—96 special housing areas and only 102 houses. It is not a very good batting average and it is a singular failure of this Government’s housing policy and its much-hyped attempt to actually increase the supply of housing. It has done everything but take meaningful action to fix it. As Phil Goff said it failed to tackle the role of property speculators in the Auckland housing market. It failed to actually build new houses that people can live in.Bill English and Nick Smith have been talking about the Resource Management Act and blaming Auckland Council for the last 10 years. Since they were in Opposition they have been blaming the Resource Management Act for the high cost of housing in Auckland but they have done nothing substantive to reform the Act and the way that councils operate within the Act—the way they set the planning rules. They are truly the hollow men on this issue. Actually the draft unitary plan that this bill seeks to facilitate is the first real bit of reform of the planning rules in Auckland. It is the first attempt actually to use urban growth boundaries in a smarter way—to avoid having them driving up section prices. It is the first real attempt to liberalise and free up density and height rules so that more houses can be built in places where people want to live. Unfortunately this Government has not pulled its weight. It has been all talk and no action when it comes to reforming the planning rules but Labour is supporting this bill because we believe the unitary plan will make a difference.