Naylor Jono: Debate on Prime Minister’s StatementText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeNaylor Jono: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement[Sitting date: 12 February 2015. Volume:703;Page:1581. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]JONO NAYLOR (National):Can I say that it is exciting to be associated with a Government that is getting on and getting things done. I found it kind of interesting to hear from the last speaker from the opposite benches who decided she would try to accuse us of dropping the ball yet at the last election ours was not the party that dropped a seat. In fact ours was a party that actually grew. And why did we grow? Well we grew in terms of the majority that we had because New Zealanders liked what they saw over the last 6 years. They liked what this Government was doing and they wanted more of it. They saw that there was something that they could be confident in and so they returned this National Government to the Treasury benches.And why did they do it? Well I can tell you that the people I speak to on the streets every day in Palmerston North have told me that it is because they have got confidence in this Government and they have got confidence in this Prime Minister and in the Minister of Finance. They have proved themselves worthy of the trust of the people of New Zealand because they are getting things moving and New Zealand is improving. But our work here is not finished. There is more for us to do. Although we are not making Mainland cheese good things do take some time so we will continue to work hard to continue to progress to ensure that New Zealand is moving forward.There have been calls from the opposite side as we have been talking about social housing that we should simply leave it alone. Well I want to tell you a story from my experiences in Palmerston North to explain just exactly why we should not leave social housing alone. Last year while campaigning during the campaign I was speaking to somebody down at the markets—at the Albert Street Market in fact—who told me that she was a Housing New Zealand tenant and had been in her house for about 30 years. I thought “Well that’s good.” She clearly needed the assistance of the New Zealand people to be able to remain in that house. She said that she was income tested and so she had to pay only $80 a week for her house. I thought “Well if that’s her situation and what she can afford then perhaps it’s appropriate that that’s what she pays.” She told me that her children had left home and that she was now living in her four-bedroom house. But do not worry; those rooms were not going to waste because those rooms were being occupied by overseas students who were paying board to this person.It was all above board to be honest because if you have two boarders you do not have to declare the income. In fact you could argue that it was very entrepreneurial on her part. But actually as I was talking to her I could not help but think of the stories that we are all told and we hear about and have come across of families with three or more children who are perhaps living in overcrowded conditions because there is not enough housing for them or appropriate housing for them to occupy. I thought perhaps they would make better use of that house than international students lining the pockets of somebody who was to be fair making a profit on the back of hard-working New Zealanders who are paying taxes and who are perhaps more deserving of that house. Although I am not saying that we should just simply evict people from those houses we do need to engage more with them and ensure that we are monitoring them and looking to ensure that the resources that we have for our social housing in New Zealand are actually being used in the most appropriate way.Yesterday Housing New Zealand came to the Social Services Committee to talk about the year in review. It is very clear that we have got greater demand for certain types of housing in certain places around New Zealand and less demand in other places. Therefore it is time something was done to rectify to that. So that is what we are doing. That is what our Minister for Social Housing is doing. She has outlined her plans to do that. She has outlined that we are not simply going to put people in houses and leave them alone for 30 years. We are going to look for new ways to manage this. We are going to engage with community organisations which might perhaps for this person have moved her on to a point where she did not need social housing any more.So we have a plan. We are going to support more New Zealanders into housing that meets their needs. We are going to ensure that they can start to move towards independence. We are going to increase the affordable housing supply particularly in Auckland. We have got a plan. We are working towards it. New Zealand will be the better for another 3 years of this National Government.