Dyson Ruth; Craig LizPart 2 Other mattersCHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): The debate is now on clauses 22 to 34 and Schedules 2 and 3—other matters. Dr LIZ CRAIG (Labour): Thank you Madam Chair. I would like to focus my contribution on clause 22 in Part 2. What this outlines is that the Government must issue a Government policy statement (GPS) on housing and urban development. This is something where we've made some changes to this particular clause as a result of some of the submissions received in select committee. So basically the original bill laid out that Ministers must issue a GPS on housing and urban development no later than 1 October 2020. However because of the huge substance that would be required in setting out the Government policy statement it was thought that that needed an extension and so this has now been extended to no later than 1 October 2021 just because of the huge number of stakeholders who would need to be consulted on such an important document of this nature.What Part 2 also outlines is the content and purpose of the GPS. Again this is something that was changed as a result of select committee submissions because in addition to outlining what should be in the GPS a number of the submitters said that it was actually quite important to outline the overall purpose of the GPS. So what we've got there are a couple of new pieces being introduced saying that in terms of the purpose of the GPS it must state the Government's overall direction and priorities for housing and urban development and also inform and guide decisions and actions of agencies involved in the activities necessary or desirable for housing and urban development.I think this is where the GPS is an incredibly important document or it's going to be because I just think where it would have relevance is down south where I'm living. Way back in the 1990s in Southland we had over 800 State houses across our region and then as a result of ongoing State housing sales just before the last election we were down to under 400 State houses in our region. The problem we've got is we've got an absolute shortage of State housing in our region so people are really really struggling to find a decent warm dry place to live particularly those looking for social housing. I think the thing is that there wasn't any overall overarching strategic vision of where we were going in housing as a country and as a region and so taking the eye off the ball over the last decade in terms of thinking about what our needs were for our community and also what we had in terms of the number of houses in our housing stock. So basically what this GPS will be incredibly important for is just creating that overall strategic direction of where we want to go in terms of provision of housing.What the bill lays out is it also gives more detail on what the GPS is needing to include. What it must include is the Government's overall direction for housing and urban development and that must include a multi-decade outlook. That's because it is going to take time after such a long long period of State housing sale to build up our housing stock. It's going to take time to build those houses and also to be thinking about where they're best placed and who those in need of housing are also thinking about a mixture of State housing but affordable housing and the different kinds of housing that are required to make a community thrive.Then basically it also needs to outline the Government's priorities for housing and urban development and how the Government expects Kāinga Ora to manage its functions and operations to meet the Government's direction and priorities for housing and urban development. So it's that broader overarching vision of where we're going as a country and thinking more in terms of Kāinga Ora's operational responsibilities in terms of delivering that. It also outlines how the Government expects other agencies to support that direction and those priorities because there's a whole range of other agencies that are involved in the provision of housing and housing support and some of those things in terms of wrapping around—say for example with tenants in State housing. Then it also must outline the Government's expectation in relation to Māori interests and partnering with Māori and protections for Māori interests and also how the Government expects Kāinga Ora to recognise the need for mitigation and adaptation to the effects of climate change. I think this is going to be incredibly important in terms of thinking with our strategic direction as climate change starts to impact in our communities and thinking about where we're having to place our housing stock whether it needs to be relocated and that's where I think a multi-decade approach to housing is also going to be incredibly important. So I think Part 2 is incredibly important in terms of that broader vision of where we're going in housing.