Davidson Marama: Residential Tenancies Amendment Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeDavidson Marama: Residential Tenancies Amendment Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 11 May 2016. Volume:713;Page:11025. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]MARAMA DAVIDSON (Green): Mr Deputy Speaker can I just ask whether there will be a bell at 1 minute?Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Yes there will.MARAMA DAVIDSON: Thank you Mr Deputy Speaker. I am standing on behalf of the Green Party to support my co-leader Metiria Turei in our opposition to the Residential Tenancies Amendment Bill because it is miserable. It is a miserable bill.I am a renter like many Māori. Māori are disproportionately represented as renters as opposed to homeowners so I have an interest in highlighting the unique impacts that rental legislation will have on Māori and Māori children and of course on lower-income people and families. They find it really difficult to live in warmer homes drier homes and safer homes.The reason why this bill is miserable is that it gets right in the way of a more comprehensive warrant of fitness and minimum good standards. The Green Party is absolutely proud to support Andrew Little’s bill for healthy homes. Those are the sorts of standards that will make an actual difference to the lives of children to the lives of our elderly and to the lives of New Zealanders.I sit here listening to what is in this bill. I was also on the Social Services Committee and I would have to challenge the statement of the previous speaker Parmjeet Parmar where she said that everybody agreed that this bill was going in the right direction. That is not at all what I heard at the select committee. There were many submitters who understood that this bill will do nothing to lower the impact on especially the load on our health system in lowering the illnesses that are directly related to poor and inadequate housing standards. I do not know why the previous speaker does not honour this House enough to be truthful about what she heard at the select committee—David Bennett: Sit down.MARAMA DAVIDSON: —no I will not sit down—because that was not at all true. It was not true.Many experts many people who have worked with families for many years and many social service advocates were very clear that this bill does not go far enough and will not rectify the cumulative impacts on people where they are not living in safe dry homes. There are things that we can do though. There are things that we can do that are not included in this bill. I note with pride Metiria Turei’s Supplementary Order Paper and the list of standards that she wishes to be maintained in rental properties and how she and the Green Party have campaigned for many years to lift the standard of housing. I hope that this is the direction—this would strengthen the bill. Metiria’s Supplementary Order Paper would strengthen this bill and actually make it worthwhile and worth voting for.I do not appreciate the fact that this legislation is being used to appease renters and to appease the public that the National Government is doing something. It is too important to appease renters—we need to get it right instead. We need to make sure the homes really are healthy and make sure the homes really are warm because there is no cost more important than ensuring that all of our children and our elderly are not going to become sicker and are going to stay alive directly because of living in good homes. Thank you for the opportunity to speak on our opposition to the Residential Tenancies Amendment Bill tonight because it is miserable. Thank you.