I don’t know about you, but I’m not very happy with all the homeless people wandering the streets and sleeping rough in the cold, some of whom are dying on park benches. But instead of blaming the victims, I think we need to look at the root cause of homelessness, being the government’s abject failure to properly account for the need to increase social housing.
Yesterday, Stuff reported:
Salvation Army report calls for increased social housing building programme
A new report authored by the Army's senior policy advisor Alan Johnson states 2000-2500 social houses need to be built around the country each year for the next decade.
That figure is the minimum needed to fix a situation that has "left Kiwi families ... in unsanitary, unsafe and unhealthy living conditions", it says.
Of course the National led government isn’t coming anywhere near that figure.
Social housing is "underfunded" and will be a "massive challenge" to address, he says.
"What we are saying is people are being displaced by other people coming into Auckland.
Immigration at current levels is clearly unsustainable.
The report says the Government's social housing building programme has allocated $36 million a year for the next four years.
That spending will provide just 90 additional houses a year at most, it says.
2000-2500 is a lot of houses to build each year and would be difficult to achieve even with government support. But only building 90 houses is simply a joke! Why even bother?
Obviously National needs some sort of excuse to show they acknowledge that the housing crisis exists, because they can no longer ignore it. The problem is they simply don’t care because it's kept house prices over-inflated and added to their false economy.
Yesterday, the NZ Herald reported:
20,000 homes needed to stop relentless rise of homelessness
Johnson said an analysis of Government statistics showed an "enduring number of people living on working-age welfare benefits" and those with limited means aged 65-plus that would only see more people in need of a home.
Data obtained through the Official Information Act showed the number of people on the social housing register had almost doubled in the past decade, and 5353 were on the Ministry of Social Development list in June this year, up from 2737 in the 2006-07 financial year.
Meanwhile the number of houses in HNZ stock had declined by 4582 across the same time period - from 67,063 in the 2007-08 year, to 62,481 in March this year.
Keep in mind that the National led government brought in measures to make even getting onto the social housing register more difficult. But that's not National's only failure concerning New Zealand's housing crisis. They're also ignoring the social pressures increased migration cause.
On Saturday, Stuff reported:
Record migration sees New Zealand population record largest ever increase
Booming migration means New Zealand's population has seen the biggest increase of all time.
Figures from Statistics New Zealand on Friday showed the population grew by 97,300 in the year to June 30, to 4.69 million.
"This is the largest annual increase ever," Statistics New Zealand said.
It appears that for every ten new migrants, one person is displaced from a house in New Zealand. As well as problems with overcrowding, this has meant a huge increase in homelessness, where there are now an estimated 40,000 Kiwis with no fixed abode, which is the worst rate in the OECD.
Another driver of the housing crisis is also being ignored by the National led government. Foreign investment, with capital gains providing a large incentive for speculation, has hindered the ability of Kiwis to buy their first home because they are being priced out of the market.
Last month, Newshub reported:
Housing capital gains are soaring in New Zealand
Analysis by Newshub has revealed just how much the housing market has risen since the last election.
The median capital gain for a New Zealand home in that time is just over $65,000. But that figure gets much, much higher when zooming into certain areas.
The Labour party has proposed a number of good measures that will tackle overseas speculators and help increase the rate of home ownership in New Zealand… important because strong communities are founded on families having a vested interest in their local areas.
This is undoubtedly a far better driver for the economy than having foreign speculators investing in housing with the expectation that Kiwis will one day be able to pay overinflated prices, especially when you compare the cost of living with incomes.
It's not just new housing and affordability that is the problems though. New Zealand's existing housing stock is badly dilapidated, particularly in the rental market.
On Thursday, Radio NZ reported:
Doctors demand action on NZ's unhealthy housing
Thousands of children are being re-admitted to hospital every year because of poor living conditions, a child health specialist says.
In a 50-page paper released today, the Royal Australasian College of Physicians has called on politicians to do more to address the causes of health inequity in New Zealand.
Too many people were living in cold, mouldy and over-crowded homes and it was ruining the health of children in particular, the college said.
The National party has utterly failed to develop policy that would remedy the housing crisis. For them, the large increase in preventable diseases and homelessness are acceptable consequences of the capital gains they and their property speculator mates are enjoying. However that gravy train looks set to end.
Yesterday, the NZ Herald reported:
Focus: NZ's housing bubble officially deflating
Figures released by Westpac show New Zealand's housing market is deflating as calls grow for LVRs to be relaxed
Unfortunately most of the analysis by market insiders doesn’t account for the actual amount of foreign speculation in the property market, because the government has been careful not to release such figures. Speculators simply won’t stick around if there are no longer large capital gains to be made, because they can make more money in other investments.
The housing market cannot continue to be propped up by foreign speculators and real estate agents misrepresenting the potential of their listings. It's a false economy that can either be systematically deflated though government intervention or crash along with the neoliberal dream that free-market ideology actually works in New Zealand.
The last National led government has utterly failed us on housing. It’s time to look towards Labour and the Greens for solutions that will actually work.
