Housing plans get recharge

Plans to build 8000 public houses will help more than 400 Auckland rough sleepers — who moved into temporary accommodation during the lockdown — find permanent homes, mayor Phil Goff says.

The Government plan to borrow $5 billion in the next four to five years to build state and transitional houses in tandem with housing providers.

Goff hoped up to 2600 would be built in Auckland, offering a chance to ease the number of city homeless.

“We now need to find permanent solutions to their plight, not simply dump them back on the street.”

The state housing waiting list is at a record high of about 15,000, almost three times as much as it was when the Government was voted in in 2017.

Yet while community housing providers were thrilled to step up and help build the homes, they warned many more were needed.

Community Housing Aotearoa chief executive Scott Figenshow said the 8000 new homes promised in Budget 2020 was only about half the number of people on the waiting list.

The 8000 new homes will be split between 6000 state houses and 2000 transitional homes and will come on top of the 6400 public houses the Government earlier said it would build by 2022 and the 1000 transitional homes announced in February.

About 70 per cent will be built by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development and 30 per cent by community housing providers — but they would be paid for and owned by the Government.

Under the previous National-led Government’s scheme community providers built state homes and then owned and rented them out.

Figenshow said community housing providers had shovel-ready projects that could kick off if the Government chose to instead fund them.

A quick poll of just 12 of the 57 providers showed they 2638 homes ready to go at a cost of $783m.