Twyford PhilURBAN DEVELOPMENT BILLSecond ReadingHon PHIL TWYFORD (Minister for Urban Development): I move That the Urban Development Bill be now read a second time. This omnibus bill provides Kāinga Ora New Zealand's housing and urban development authority with functions powers rights and duties to enable it to undertake its urban development functions. The bill complements the Kāinga Ora—Homes and Communities Act which established Kāinga Ora as a Crown entity on 1 October 2019 and set out its objectives functions and operating principles. The purpose of this bill is to facilitate urban development that contributes to sustainable inclusive and thriving communities. Kāinga Ora will work in partnership with iwi local government developers and others in the urban development sector to deliver communities that provide a diverse mix of good quality affordable housing choices and good access to jobs transport public amenities and open space. I want to thank the Environment Committee for its work on this bill. Their efforts have improved the bill. I would also like to thank the members of the public who took time to make written and oral submissions. A majority of submitters supported the bill's direction. Some suggested ways that its provisions could be improved in terms of how they work in practice and the committee has taken these concerns on board. I want to acknowledge the wealth of technical expertise offered both by local government and industry practitioners. Their contributions were invaluable and have led to improvements in the bill. Even before COVID-19 New Zealand's cities faced some formidable challenges such as flattening productivity and difficulties in accommodating growth in transport particularly and many many parts of the country have grappled with dysfunctional housing markets shortages of housing and very high-priced urban land. These issues remain. We're making good progress on them but it's become even more essential that we address them in the current post-COVID environment. Along with the other tools in our Urban Growth Agenda reforming the way we finance and fund infrastructure for urban growth and freeing up the planning rules so that our cities can grow up and grow out we also need to find ways of ensuring that large-scale and sometimes complex urban development projects can be facilitated. This bill will work alongside the COVID-19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Bill and when both of them are passed they will together progress much-needed development and infrastructure in our towns and cities. While some of their objectives overlap and both include streamlined Resource Management Act (RMA) consenting the Urban Development Bill is different in its targeting. Large-scale transformational projects are key to creating well-designed cities that provide for our future needs. The big challenge for New Zealand cities in the 21st century is that we must enable second-generation growth quality intensification. In cities that were often designed and built in the middle decades of the 20th century the challenge now is to build a more efficient and more sustainable and livable urban form. That's not always easy because of the fragmentation of land title the problems with ageing infrastructure and the complexity of having multiple stakeholders communities residents and businesses in existing built-up cities. This bill gives Kāinga Ora the tools and the mandate and the duties to enable that role to be played. It allows Kāinga Ora to initiate facilitate and undertake a special type of complex transformational urban development. The bill describes them as specified development projects. For those listening to this debate we're talking about projects that entail the building of whole new communities on a scale that will deliver thousands of new dwellings new transport infrastructure and places for businesses and industry and residential development. The bill gives Kāinga Ora access to a tool kit of development powers and access to land acquisition powers when undertaking any kind of urban development project. The tools will enable Kāinga Ora to develop multiple aspects of the urban environment with greater certainty integration and speed. The specified development project process is at the heart of the bill. It brings together multiple disconnected development processes and enables them to be accessed through a single more streamlined process without losing important checks and balances. It brings together all of the powers that local government currently wields but in one place in a joined-up and streamlined way for the express purpose of speeding up complex large-scale development projects. The tool kit of development powers that come with a specified development project include streamlined RMA planning and consenting processes powers to build and change network infrastructure such as roads three waters and public transport and the ability to create or reconfigure parks and reserves. These are the kinds of tools that enable a development project to become a community. Kāinga Ora will have new mechanisms to fund urban development including targeted rates development contributions betterment payments and service charges. It will also have access to land acquisition powers which can be used for specified development projects and more widely on all of its urban development projects. Each of these powers is designed to address a specific barrier to development that currently exist. These powers will be applied flexibly based on the needs of each individual project and—importantly—subject to appropriate checks and balances. There are a range of checks and balances in the bill. We're very conscious in designing this legislation that Kāinga Ora with all of these tools brought together in one place is a powerful entity at the service of urban development and it's important that the property rights of incumbent owners in a development project—it's important that the community and the local residents and the community of interests that may be affected by developments on this scale all have a say in the process and their rights are respected. The bill recognises the importance of protecting the environment and ensuring good access to open spaces. It provides for the protection of significant environmental interests alongside historic heritage and cultural considerations and there are multiple points along the process that is set out in this bill for the creation of these specified development projects at which concerns can be raised and issues debated and interests protected during the process. The bill recognises the aspirations that Māori have in urban development as potential development partners as people significantly impacted by the historical and current pressures in the housing market and through Māori connections with the land and natural resources in a project area. The bill establishes protections for Māori land and it includes engagement requirements designed to ensure that Kāinga Ora identifies and supports Māori aspirations for urban development including by providing opportunities to participate in development. That's important because from one end of this country to the other iwi and other Māori organisations—particularly in the post-settlement era—are some of the most active investors and developers in large-scale urban development projects. Kāinga Ora will work in partnership with iwi local government and the private sector and we've taken on board the longstanding concerns about this kind of legislation from the private sector and from local government—fears that this could see them being crowded out. The specified development project process is designed as a joint venture vehicle that can include private developers can include iwi and can include councils. The committee received 133 submissions on the bill. Those submitters represented groups and individuals with an interest in housing and urban development and as a result of those submissions the committee made improvements particularly around engagement and partnership. The first significant change made to the bill was to emphasise the importance of early engagement reinforcing the importance of Kāinga Ora undertaking that engagement in a way that reflects the needs of all people involved. Submitters raised the need for Kāinga Ora to partner in order to be successful and that principle has been greatly strengthened in the bill. Submitters raised concerns around infrastructure requirements particularly the possibility of councils inheriting infrastructure that might not be fit for purpose—it could either be gold-plated or substandard—so there are provisions to now ensure that Kāinga Ora identifies the technical design standards for that infrastructure before it's actually built. The changes recommended by the committee in my view significantly improve the bill and support its general purpose. This bill will allow us to deliver more and better housing and will allow our cities to build great new urban neighbourhoods and communities for people to live and work and play. I want to thank the members of the committee for their work on the bill. They've improved it and on this basis I commend the bill to the House.