Luxon keen to talk Nats housing plan with Govt
Labour has again reached out to National to come to the table in an attempt to find common ground over housing.
National leader Christopher Luxon is keen to take up the offer – as long as the Government adopts their policy.
Luxon said National would ‘‘love to sit down with them and actually do a bipartisan deal on our policy’’.
‘‘I think we’ve got a great policy. It’d be fantastic in a spirit of bipartisanship for them to adopt it.’’
Housing Minister Megan Woods wrote to National over the weekend after the Opposition abandoned most of its support around a 2021 bipartisan deal on housing intensification and announced its own housing growth election package. She reached out again yesterday.
‘‘We need to have a conversation,’’ Woods said. ‘‘Labour certainly didn’t go in and dictate what it would be, and we didn’t sign up to everything that National said that they wanted. That’s exactly the way bipartisanship should work ... which was sitting down and working together.
‘‘And that’s why I’ve reached out again this morning and invited National to sit down and let’s have a chat about this. Let’s see if we can get back to that grown up moment of New Zealand politics.’’
National housing spokesperson Chris Bishop said he was happy to meet with Woods.
‘‘Some of what we’re talking about is similar to what Labour has themselves said in the past,’’ he said. ‘‘So if we can find a common ground there, that’s a good thing.
‘‘If the Labour Party wants to come to the party and pick up some of these ideas, we are all for that, because we have got to get on top of this 30-year public policy disaster.’’
Luxon said the previous bipar
tisan approach was a ‘‘big improvement over the status quo at the time’’, however National’s latest policy was ‘‘an improvement over that’’.
National announced on Sunday morning its housing package to force councils in major towns and cities to zone for 30 years’ worth of growth immediately, while giving councils the ability to opt-out of the Medium Density Residential Zone law.
National and Labour teamed up in 2021 to allow buildings of up to three storeys on most sites in cities without any need for resource consent.
Luxon said earlier this month his party was ‘‘wrong’’ when his now deputy leader Nicola Willis joined the Government for a bipartisan commitment to greater housing intensification.
Woods said one of the most important aspects of planning laws was the certainty that bipartisanship gives.
‘‘That’s why we accepted the invitation from Judith Collins and Nicola Willis in the first place to work together on this.’’
Asked if Labour would consider taking on all of National’s proposed changes in order for a bipartisan approach, Woods said it would require a conversation.
She said the 2021 housing accord ‘‘wasn’t just one party dictating’’.
‘‘It’s not just a matter of saying, we’d sign up to all the changes they want to make. There’s some things I’m struggling to understand in the National Party policy position.’’
‘‘I think we’ve got a great policy. It’d be fantastic in a spirit of bipartisanship for them to adopt it.’’
Christopher Luxon National Party leader