Dyson RuthRATES REBATE (RETIREMENT VILLAGE RESIDENTS) AMENDMENT BILLFirst ReadingHon RUTH DYSON (Labour—Port Hills): I move That the Rates Rebate (Retirement Village Residents) Amendment Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Local Government and Environment Committee to consider this bill. Can I give a bit of background to the rates rebate scheme? It was one of the many visions that Prime Minister Norman Kirk had in the early 1970s because he knew that for a lot of people with low fixed incomes—particularly people on benefits on superannuation or in a low-income job—their annual rates bill presented a big challenge. His idea was to have a scheme funded by central government through taxpayers' money where people who were in that situation people who had quite a high rates bill and quite a low income could apply for some financial relief. The rates had to be at a certain level the income had to be at a certain level and it is a sliding scale according to how high your rates are and how low your income is.When that Act was passed in the early 1970s the concept of a retirement village with its occupancy agreement—the licence to occupy regime—was pretty well unknown. It was the 1970s; we did not have retirement villages in the way that we have now and now there are nearly 30000 people living under such a regime. Retirement village residents who have a licence to occupy are required to pay their rates. They pay them through either their weekly or monthly management fee they pay them to the owner of the village and the owner of the village then obviously pays rates to the council. Despite paying their rates through those management fees retirement village residents living in a licence-to-occupy home are not eligible to apply for rates rebates. That is unfair and it is that unfairness that this bill seeks to address. The bill will fix this problem by expanding the coverage of the rates rebate scheme to people living in licence-to-occupy homes. This was one of the gaps in the scheme that was identified from a review done in 2007 and was actually on our work plan to address but of course we came second in the 2008 election and did not get a chance to introduce that and many other progressive changes.Some people have registered concern with me that expanding the eligibility of the rates rebate scheme in this way is unfair to people in rental properties. I had looked at that some years ago and I relooked at it. In my view there is a clear difference between retirement village residents and tenants of rental properties. If you live in a retirement village you have to pay a substantial capital sum—the same as you pay for a titled property actually. You pay about the same amount. When you leave that retirement village unit or you die either you or your estate benefits from funds from the sale of the unit. They do not get it back in the same way as a regular sale would because they have often got deferred management fees to pay but those circumstances—the capital sum purchase and the ability to recoup some of the value of the property when you leave or die—are not comparable to the situation of someone who is renting a property. They come in and leave and they do not have any capital investment in the place so this is a genuine gap in the scheme for people who pay rates.Some of our local authorities have recognised and addressed this anomaly but they have done that by using ratepayers' money to give residents in retirement villages a rates remission. It is generally—not always but generally—paid on the same basis as the rates remission scheme but it is paid for with ratepayers' money not taxpayers' money. That is unfair on these councils it is unfair on ratepayers in those areas and it is unfair on residents who live in districts who do not get the same remission from their councils. Those councils have said: It's central government's role to provide a rates rebate not ours." So this would allow those territorial local authorities to keep that ratepayers' money for the purposes for which it was paid actually rather than for something that central government should be paying.About 50 percent of residents in retirement villages are entirely dependent on New Zealand Superannuation. Those people would be entitled to apply for a rates rebate if they lived just two houses down the road from the retirement village in a place that had their name on the title. It is only because our legislation has not kept pace with the changing living arrangements that this situation exists. For someone on a low fixed income facing the payment of a rates bill is often hard. The rates rebate recognises that and gives these people some financial relief. It pays only a small proportion of the total rates bill but it is certainly of assistance. In my view residents of retirement villages deserve that support. I trust that other members of the House agree with their entitlement to receive that support and that this bill is passed to the Local Government and Environment Committee for further consideration. Thank you."