Little AndrewANDREW LITTLE (Leader of the Opposition): The only assertion that comes close to having an evidence base to it in Mr Seymour's speech just now is his statement that Santa does exist. We have heard a lot about this free market. There are some things about the free market that Mr Seymour has not articulated that I will come to but perhaps I could reassure Mr Seymour this way: although it is official Labour policy that Santa does not exist there is a possibility that there may be fairies at the bottom of the garden and I am prepared to concede that point.The thing about free markets is this—if you want to have a free market there are a number of other conditions that have to apply such as symmetry of information and equality of power and that includes financial power as well. The reality is that in our housing market right now there is not equality of bargaining power through equality of financial power there is definitely not symmetry of information—there is asymmetry of information—and all the evidence that is available to Mr Seymour and everybody in this Committee and the rest of New Zealand is that our housing market is just dysfunctional. How is it that in a country of 4.5 million people in a city of l.5 million people and when the average income is what $55000 $57000 we have an average house price of $1 million? That is not the mark of a functioning market; that is the mark of a dysfunctional market. So interventions are required.You could say the Government has heroically embarked upon housing accords and special housing areas as a justified intervention in the market. Certainly the objectives were good. Certainly the intentions were good. But actually when you look at the evidence and the practical effect of those special housing areas so far they are not achieving what they were intended to achieve. Roughly a third of the special housing areas—only a third—have had houses built on them which means two-thirds have not. We know that in special housing areas set aside for the building of houses including affordable houses—it simply has not happened in two-thirds of the special housing areas and the land available in those housing areas.The policy is not working. Noble as it is to say Listen let's extend it. Let's give it another 3 years." that will be meaningless without Supplementary Order Paper 210 advanced by Metiria Turei requiring and specifying a proportion of affordably priced houses in those areas. That is vital—that is vital. That has been the missing element in the special housing areas programme so far.There have been some great projects in which affordable houses have been delivered and some of them have been in special housing areas and others have not. The truth is this—the reality is this—the need for affordable housing of a huge volume is now urgent. We now need urgent action to get affordable houses built. Getting special housing areas working properly and a policy working properly could be a solution. But it will be a solution only if they deliver affordable houses. It will not be a solution if we just extend the period during which special housing areas can be created and housing accords can continue to be activated without a statutory mandate for a proportion of those houses to be affordable. That is what is needed.That is the Labour Party policy proposal. That is the Labour Party comprehensive housing package—to have a housing programme dedicated to affordable housing. That is the desperate shortage in New Zealand at the moment. Young couples no matter how hard they work or save cannot afford to buy their first home and how could they when the proportion of their income—or the multiple of their income—required to buy a house at least in Auckland is now pushing 10 times that income? It is out of reach. If we are to stave off a bunch of other social issues or social problems further down the track then the need to get affordable houses built in New Zealand today is utterly urgent.The bill as it stands at the moment in this part in Part 1 does not go far enough. We need a specific mandate as provided for in the Supplementary Order Paper for a proportion of affordable houses."