Woods MeganHon Dr MEGAN WOODS (Minister of Housing): Yesterday we—Hon David Bennett: You're sweating Trevor.Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: —made an announcement that we on this side—SPEAKER: Order! Order! Mr Bennett will leave the Chamber.Hon David Bennett withdrew from the Chamber. Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: Yesterday we made an announcement as a Government that we are incredibly proud of on this side of the House. We announced a package of measures to finally address a housing crisis in New Zealand—a package of measures that bring together both demand and supply measures. Often when Governments have come to look at the incredibly difficult issue of housing and how we address it they do either demand or supply. What we did yesterday was bring together those measures into one place. But more than that if we have a look at what we've done with our supply package we've had a look at what we need to do to tilt the balance in favour of new supply. We see that what we are doing is finally addressing the very long-run problem that if you talk to anyone—you talk to councils you talk to developers you talk to iwi you talk to anyone that has been trying to build houses in this country—they will tell you the thing that is holding them back is not just land supply but it is supply of build-ready land. The reality is we could change the planning rules in this country we could rezone every bit of the country that doesn't currently have a house on it but unless someone is paying for the pipes that sit under that ground or the roads that lead to that land we will not see houses built. And that is what we are incredibly proud of that for the first time since the 1970s a central government is stepping up at this scale and addressing that most fundamental of problems.What we have done is put in place a range of demand and supply measures that unashamedly tilts the balance towards new supply. For too long we have had mum and dad investors competing with their first-home buying kids in the burbs for the same houses. This is not the New Zealand we want to see. If we look at the carve-outs and the exemptions and the extension of the brightline test and what we're doing around interest deductibility we're saying to those New Zealanders who want to invest in property By all means do it but come be part of the solution to finally fix the housing crisis. Help us build new houses and you won't have an extension in your brightline test. You will still be able to claim interest deductibility because that is the behaviour we want to see." And we know that these are the long-term changes that we need to make.Some of the changes that we will see will show immediate effect. We will see immediate effect particularly from our demand-side package of changes which includes the changes to the first-home products that will come in almost immediately. But some of these are the long-term change we need to see to secure a steady pipeline of building and construction not over the next one two three years—we've got to have the courage to look beyond that three-year political cycle—but what will be the pipeline over the next 10 to 20 years of building and construction. We need to make sure that we once and for all can confront this housing crisis we face.We know that there is no silver bullet there is no quick fix there is no one thing that is going to fix the housing crisis that we need to have a programme of work that integrates together that makes anything we are doing around infrastructure work in lock step with a requirement for housing to be built for land development to occur—and that is exactly what we will do. In the contestable fund that we set up we will not do what the previous Government with their Housing Infrastructure Fund did which was give loans to councils but no requirement for land development to occur—and I invite anyone to look up how many houses we've seen as a result of that billion-dollar fund that the previous Government set up. I'll give you a clue: very very very few. Because what we need to do is make sure we are integrating and we are looking on this as a package and we need to make sure that we are backing first-home buyers we are backing those that need affordable rentals and all we're hearing from the Opposition is the normal cancel culture we hear from the National Party."