Faafoi Kris: Social Housing Reform (Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters Amendment) Bill — First ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeFaafoi Kris: Social Housing Reform (Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters Amendment) Bill — First Reading[Sitting date: 16 May 2013. Volume:690;Page:10112. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]KRIS FAAFOI (Labour—Mana): The way that Budgets usually work is that a whole lot of documents get dumped on us and we and our staff ferret away for a wee while to find out where the nuggets are—where the secrets really are—that the Government has hidden amongst the figures. But you do not to look very far in this Budget in terms of this bill the Social Housing Reform (Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters Amendment) Bill because it is actually in the press release that Dr Nick Smith put out. At the end of the first page of his press release around this policy it says in a very simple sentence: “The review of tenancies will be undertaken with common sense.” We all know that Dr Nick Smith and common sense are mutually exclusive. They just do not work together. So when Dr Nick Smith says that the review of tenancies will be undertaken with common sense we know that that means in English that the National Government will stuff this up—it will stuff this up.What it wants to do as many speakers on this side of the House have said is over a number of years evict 3000 people from their State homes—3000 people from their State homes. That is 3000 families from State homes and they will be from right around the country including in Sam Lotu-Iiga’s electorate and including in my electorate. There will be many many people from right around the country who will find themselves being evicted from a State home. This continues the trend of Dr Nick Smith running things into the ground—running things into the ground. He was not happy enough with running ACC into the ground creating a huge crisis there. He was not happy with that. Dr Nick Smith was not happy with taking the wrecking ball to local government. So now that he is back in Cabinet reformed he is back and he is taking the wrecking ball to Housing New Zealand.This is a very serious issue especially in my electorate of Mana because there are a lot of State housing tenants in my electorate. The issue of Housing New Zealand matters—of waiting lists of maintenance of the supply of enough housing—is a major issue and probably takes up half the time of my electorate staff. They will be very worried at what the Government is proposing in this bill—very worried—because it continues a trend from National of taking the hammer to Housing New Zealand. We talk about Nick Smith undertaking these measures with common sense. Was it common sense from this Government to close down the Housing New Zealand office in Porirua to shut the door to the public to the tenants to the thousands of the corporation’s tenants in Porirua? Was that common sense Dr Nick Smith? Was that common sense I ask the National Party? Was it common sense that Phil Heatley started an 0800 number which no one could get an answer from. No one would answer the phone. It took minutes if not hours for people to get someone just to simply answer the phone. Was that common sense from the Government? If that was common sense from the Government in those two areas what can we expect from the Government in terms of evicting 3000 people out of State homes?Is it common sense the way that this Government is undertaking its earthquake-strengthening programme? Is that common sense? But what we have got here is another effort from Nick Smith to run Housing New Zealand into the ground. This Government does not like Housing New Zealand. Let us make that clear. It would prefer to wash its hands of what it probably considers to be the State house problem. That is what is happening here. The Government is washing its hands of the State house problem. It hasclosed down the offices so no longer can someone in my electorate simply go along to someone behind the counter and ask: “What is up with my house? What is up with my maintenance?”. There is no customer service there—no customer service whatsoever. There is no customer service in Porirua at all. So what they have to do now is ring up Phil Heatley’s 0800 number wait for at least 45 minutes to get someone to answer the phone and then it takes months—Hon Member: Or longer.KRIS FAAFOI: —or longer—to get something as simple as a broken window fixed. But no when tenants are 2 weeks in arrears with their rent the corporation comes down like a tonne of bricks—it comes down like a tonne of bricks. If you want to wreck something it is obvious that Nick Smith is the person to get in to do the job—absolutely. ACC was not enough and local government was not enough. Housing New Zealand is next in his sights and that is a very very sad thing for the people of New Zealand.