How meth in state houses is costing us all

Nearly 150 Christchurch homes could have been bought with the money Housing New Zealand has spent on fixing methamphetamine infested houses in the past two years.

The state housing provider has forked out $72.9 million on testing and decontaminating state homes – but it has been almost toothless in its efforts to recoup the losses to taxpayers.

Of the 10 worst homes – some of which had cleanup bills in excess of $100,000 – Housing NZ has been able to pursue costs for only one, in Manukau, south Auckland. Even then, it was for only a fraction of the amount claimed.

The multimillion-dollar bill comes as drug experts express scepticism over the health risk from houses in which meth has been smoked, rather than manufactured.

NZ Drug Foundation executive director Ross Bell said HNZ treated each contaminated house as if it had been a meth lab, and the money spent was largely wasted. The science and advice – which HNZ had seen – showed there was no real danger in a home where meth had been used, but not made.

‘‘You cannot call it contamination from meth use. It is not a thing.’’

He accused the meth testing and cleanup industry of running ‘‘New Zealand’s biggest scam’’, and believed HNZ would be better off trying to help its tenants with meth problems, rather than kicking them and their families out of homes.

Drug-and-alcohol counsellor Roger Brooking felt the need for testing had been ‘‘hugely overblown’’, as homes in which people had smoked P were no more toxic for the next tenants than those in which cigarettes had been smoked. ‘‘I suspect that HNZ has wasted millions and millions of dollars decontaminating houses that didn’t need to be decontaminated.’’

The $72.9m cost over the past two financial years would have been enough to buy 148 houses at Christchurch’s median house price of $491,626118.

Housing NZ, which released the figures in an Official Information Act response, said it sought compensation from tenants only in cases where it believed it could establish the contamination occurred due to a breach of the tenancy agreement, and that a case could be taken to the Tenancy Tribunal.

‘‘This generally means evidence such as a police report relating to methamphetamine use or paraphernalia at the tenancy, or credible eyewitness testimony.’’

In its response, HNZ outlined the challenges in trying to recover costs associated with meth contamination. The organisation only has 60 days to lodge a claim for compensation, using the address provided by the tenant.

‘‘This is problematic due to the time required to test, assess and remediate contaminated properties, and the difficulty establishing the location of tenants after they have vacated,’’ acting chief operating officer Neil Adams said.

In the Manukau case, HNZ paid $103,041 to test and decontaminate the home, but a debt of only $4208 was established for the tenant, which was being paid off at just $10 a week. HNZ could not charge the tenant remedial costs, because confirmation of the contamination fell outside the 60-day window, Adams said.

In the nine other most expensive meth bills nationwide, a debt could not be established ‘‘for similar reasons, or because we had insufficient evidence the tenants contaminated the property’’.