Ngaro AlfredALFRED NGARO (National): I rise to take a call in this first reading of the Housing Legislation Amendment Bill which is going through all stages. First I want to acknowledge that this National-led Government has a comprehensive plan for housing.Hon Members: Ha ha!ALFRED NGARO: That is right. We hear the heckling. But here is the proof of the pudding. Over there on that side the spokesperson on housing has often confirmed the comprehensive plan. When we think about the devolution of stock into the community housing providers—it was at the conference where the Labour spokesperson on housing turned around and said We support this. This is a good idea. We should do this." and then all of a sudden when we were doing it he disagreed with it. When it came to the metropolitan urban limits the Labour spokesperson on housing turned around and said "No this is not a great idea. We shouldn't attack this." and then all of a sudden when we were addressing the metropolitan urban limits he changed again. Why? Because he saw that this was a comprehensive plan. We know it is comprehensive. We know it is making a difference. This Housing Legislation Amendment Bill does two things in particular. It extends two Acts which we think is important and it also puts a time limit on the consenting process. We think that is important. The previous speaker talked about the whole issue around the crisis. But if the speakers on the other side have actually done their homework and I hope that they have they will realise that this issue has been bubbling up since 1974. In fact a previous Cabinet Minister in the Labour Government the Hon Dr Michael Bassett was commissioned by The New Zealand Initiative to write a report. The report was called Priced Out. In that report he talked about when housing became unaffordable in New Zealand. Inside that report he clearly states that this is an issue that has been happening since 1974. Why? Because we have not been building to projected forecast growth in New Zealand over that period of time. We know that that has been happening for quite some time so we think that is really important. Also although the little mumbling and ground-grinding over there—[Interruption] Yes maybe he needs to listen. If he has read the Productivity Commission's report what does it also say? It says that one of the critical issues is around the slow process of consenting. The special housing accord allows for us to fast track the consenting so that we can ensure that we can address the issue. What does it say? It says that the issue is around supply. This housing issue is around supply. We think that this is critically important. The National-led Government wants to extend the Housing Accords and Special Housing Areas Act so that more special housing areas can be established and are appropriate for those different areas as well. We know that currently in Auckland which is one of the most difficult places there are 213 special housing areas—at least 140 of those are in the Auckland area—and that is making a difference. This will allow for the capacity of nearly 70000 homes—almost 65000 of those are in the Auckland area. This becomes critical. When people have talked about the metropolitan urban limits and if we talk about Auckland in particular where this becomes a critical issue and the housing accord and this bill become of greatest importance the metropolitan urban limits came in 1999 under the Auckland Regional Council. It was an arbitrary line that was drawn. We know that from that period of time we could see the challenges that were happening. In 2008 Gordon Copeland who was a member of the Commerce Committee went up to Auckland. That committee conducted an inquiry. It clearly said that the metropolitan urban limits were allowing for land banking hence the reason why this bill becomes critically important in addressing that issue as well. This legislation will allow for a variation of applications begun but not completed under the law to continue when a district plan becomes operative. We know that the current unitary plan will come into place on 16 September this year so that is the reason why it is important for us to extend that and to allow for the opportunities for that development to happen. We know also that when we think about what currently exists we think about the incentivised process of this plan and why that becomes important. We can look at some of the numbers—the construction growth. The number of homes being constructed per year in areas with housing accords has grown from 10599 in the year to June 2013 to 18693 to June of this year. We know that it makes a difference. We see that is important. I commend this bill and look forward to the ongoing debate in the House under urgency. I commend this bill at its first reading to the House."