O'Rourke DenisDENIS O'ROURKE (NZ First): This Government claimed that it has a comprehensive housing strategy. That is laughable—laughable. To the Government the term comprehensive housing strategy" is just a name not a reality. If it had a strategy we would have heard about it years ago because strategies are long term. In fact it is just a term that has been invented by the National Government in the last few days purely for political spin purposes. Everybody in this country knows that this Government does not have and never has had a housing strategy let alone a comprehensive one. That is the truth of the matter. Even if it were a strategy it would be clearly one that has been aimed at accelerating house prices to over a million dollars in Auckland and having them rise steeply in other parts of the country. It would also be a strategy characterised by a design for skilled workers to be forced out of Auckland where they are needed most because they cannot afford a home. It would be one that tolerates people living in cars tents and under bridges and that sort of thing. When you look at the Estimates—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Oh thank you!DENIS O'ROURKE: Yes I have looked at the Estimates Mr Chairman.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Let's talk about them.DENIS O'ROURKE: And when you do that you see this. You see that what I am saying is absolutely true because what it provides for is this: a total of $257 million over 4 years. That is an average of about $64 million per year. But of that $200 million or an average of $50 million per year—the lion's share of it—is to top up the income-related rent subsidy. So that is absolutely nothing new. There is nothing strategic about that at all; it is just business as usual. In addition to that there is $41 million for emergency housing again over 4 years. That is only about $10 million per year and in fact Minister Bennett admits that all that will do is maintain the status quo for emergency housing. Emergency housing is needed of course because this Government has not actually got a housing plan or strategy so it needs emergency housing which should not be necessary if there was an adequate housing plan in the first place. It is just a band-aid at the bottom of the cliff. It is not even an ambulance at the bottom of the cliff just a band-aid. The $10 million per year will not go very far for emergency housing. It is just a bit more money to put people into more motel rooms while the panic continues over how they should be housed properly. So there is no strategy no genuine plan. New Zealand First also objects to this other provision in the Budget which is one entitled "Growing the Māori Housing Network". That is a fund allocated at $3.15 million per year for 4 years—a total of $12.6 million—for "repairing and building homes for whānau living in substandard accommodation including emergency housing". It should not be necessary to have a separate budget provision for housing for Māori. The truth is that people in this country who cannot afford housing cannot find a place to live in need to be assisted whether they are Māori or Pākehā—whatever their race may be. It is wrong to allocate funding like that according to race and New Zealand First strongly objects to that. What New Zealand First does want is what the Government is not actually providing which is a genuine long-term housing strategy. That is something we believe needs to be done independently of the political process by a housing commission. It needs to be based on a much much greater degree of direct Government investment in housing: by way of the Government providing the funds for the purchase of land where it is needed for residential housing; by seeing that that land gets developed; and by selling sections and built houses on easy terms to first-home buyers directly probably on a subordinated loan basis so that the people could still go and get a bank loan if they wished as well. So that is the kind of policy we see as being necessary."