Williams Poto: Social Housing Reform (Transaction Mandate) Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeWilliams Poto: Social Housing Reform (Transaction Mandate) Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 17 February 2016. Volume:711;Page:9105. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]POTO WILLIAMS (Labour—Christchurch East): Firstly I want to start with the name of this bill. I know we will go through the title and commencement at some stage but I think it is really interesting that we are calling this bill the Social Housing Reform (Transaction Mandate) Bill when this is actually about State housing—State housing owned by the people of New Zealand. That is every member in this Chamber every member sitting in the gallery and people watching at home—State housing. When did State housing become social housing? State housing is the provision of housing for the people of New Zealand. Social housing is about providing for vulnerable communities.Mr Smith State housing has long been a treasure a taonga in the State’s arsenal to keep people well in communities. There is no doubt that for people who are able to put down roots in a community long term the benefits to them and to the wider community and wider society are exponential. Social housing is about providing a specific need for a specific vulnerable group.My understanding from my interactions with Housing New Zealand as a provider of refuge accommodation for women and children who experience family violence is that Housing New Zealand was set up to support the delivery of State housing when people could not access housing themselves. It had a community arm that took care of the social needs of specific vulnerable groups like the disabled like the mentally unwell and like women and children escaping violent relationships. When did State housing become social housing? It was when this Government decided to confuse the two to make it an issue around the provision of just social housing. It is not. State housing is the State’s commitment to house its people. That is what this is about and that is why we oppose this bill.Labour has been housing its people since the day we first became a Government. It sits at the heart of who we are as Labour. It is our core value to ensure that people have a decent roof over their head. In times of record homelessness this Government is seeking to sell off our assets—what is owned by us as people. That is despicable.And then we have this issue of accountability where the Ministers have complete control over the sale process. They have complete control over whom they sell to and what they actually get for that asset. That is unprecedented in this Parliament. The departmental disclosure statement says: “The transaction mandate is an unusual legal mechanism.”—an unusual legal mechanism. Does that not cause us some alarm? Well it should do. If you are listening to this speech at home you should be alarmed because the Ministers will have unfettered powers to do what they like with our assets. That is not right. They can determine whom they make the transaction with and how much they sell the asset off for. This is our housing. These are our tenants.These are the people about whom the Minister is wanting to say when there are issues around State housing tenants that they are actually vexatious. When State housing tenants want transfers the Minister says: “Oh no they turned that transfer down because they did not like the colour of the door.” Well that is rubbish. I have never had a constituent who is desperate for a house or wanting a State house transfer say to me: “No I don’t like the colour of that door. I’m not going to take that house.”I want the Minister to actually prove those statements because what they are doing is making the people of New Zealand think that people who access State care whether it be State housing or social service provisions are worth less than anybody else. Well they are not. They are completely entitled to the provision of social services and they are completely entitled to that State care. We should support them to do that. We should not vilify them. This Government does vilify people who access State services. This Government would really want those people to go away. What does the Government do? Rather than actually providing the types of mechanisms that will develop people give them strength and allow them to get on with what they need to do it pulls the rug from underneath them.Who is going to purchase these fine assets at the fire sale that will happen? Well it will not be community housing providers—the ones that actually will provide for the most vulnerable. Do you know why? It is because they do not want the houses in such poor condition the houses that this Government has let get rundown. I can see Mr Ngaro looking confused. I am sure Mr Ngaro if you were to have a look at the State housesaround the areas where people live close to where you live you would see that the condition of some of our State houses is not that good. Community housing providers did not want to take on this stock because of the cost not only to purchase it but to actually bring it up to some kind of standard. They do not want their clients the people whom they service to live in damp mouldy homes that need maintenance. They did not want them.So where will these houses go? They will go to corporates. We know that corporates are not driven by social outcomes. They are not driven by delivering warm dry affordable homes to people; they are driven by profit. For me the profit motive is not one that actually delivers good social outcomes.I am really concerned that when these houses are moved on to corporates the tenants of these homes are not going to have security of tenure. Security of tenure is really important. Whether you are a tenant or whether you own your own home the ability for you to raise a family to put down roots to engage in community life and to build some social capital from the people who live in your neighbourhoods and close to you is the very fabric of good society. We know that a lot of our social harms at the moment are because our populations are so transient that we cannot get services to stick to them because they move from place to place from couch to couch and from one desperate housing situation to the next.I am really angry that we are at the point where we are selling off what is an absolute taonga to this country—something that Labour has built up over time and that National Governments have actually recognised the value of. We introduced low-interest loans and we introduced the capitalisation of the family benefit to get people into owning their homes and when a National Government came in after us it kept those policies because it knew how vital it was to a good society to have people own their own homes. It knew the value of having secure homes whether you owned them or whether the State owned them. It knew the value of housing its population.We should not feel that being in a State house means we are worth any less. Being in a State house should be a gold standard. Unfortunately our State houses have been so poorly maintained that they are no longer a gold standard and the people who live within them cannot guarantee that they will be healthy and well. Mr Chairman I am going to contribute more during the course of this Committee stage but I thank you for your indulgence.