Fix for the housing crisis has been here all along

It’s a good idea to get out of the city and go visit your family. Firstly, it’s nice to see your fam. But, if you need further convincing, you could also discover solutions to some of New Zealand’s most pressing issues when you head home. At least, that’s what happened yesterday when I arrived in Picton.

The small seaside town is known, almost exclusively, for its ferry terminals. There are also two pharmacies, three fish and chip shops and a housing complex that hasn’t increased its rent for four years. Yes, I’ve found a landlord who isn’t greedy. I double-checked that figure, too. I couldn’t believe it!

In a world where property managers make memes to laugh at their tenants’ poverty, a story like this sounds like a dream (or a nightmare if you work at Quinovic Te Aro). It is, however, real life for the tenants who live in a small community at Waikawa Marae.

My marae set up its own papaka¯ inga years ago, with on-site housing and a community garden known as the maara kai. Tenants pay rent, but the marae operates with a community, rather than profit, focus.

In theory, it’s idyllic. It’s got me wondering why more of us don’t live in papaka¯ inga-style housing. The old-school pa¯ is a genius solution to a very real problem for future generations. With the cost of land unlikely to fall, renting will be a reality more of us face. Without change, renting won’t be cheaper either.

Even if we can afford a roof over our heads, will we really be living? Or just funding our landlords’ social lives?

Housing Minister Phil Twyford has some ideas to help out. His first plan is to sell some ‘‘affordable’’ houses to presumably upper-middle class people, as part of the KiwiBuild programme.

Then, on Monday, he announced plans to make life easier for those still renting. His discussion paper suggests making it easier for renters to have pets, and making it harder for landlords to end tenancies. Landlords will still be able to kick out bad tenants, but they won’t be able to end a tenancy for no reason.

The paper’s biggest suggestion was about rent itself. Twyford says it should be able to go up only once a year, and tenants should be warned about rent increases early. He has also moved to ban letting fees by the start of next year.

On the whole, the Monday announcement was more about making renting fairer.

It was not groundbreaking. For renters, it says things might be slightly better but still not great. For landlords, I presume there will be little impact. Yet Twyford’s paper still shook some property moguls.

They rolled out their talking heads to try to halt progress and scare tenants by threatening rent rises. Those lobbyists told us a lot of strange things this week.

Landlord Peter Lewis said changes would make it harder for renters. He then listed a bunch of costs and suggested everything, the whole damned economy, could be worse off because of rules to make life slightly fairer for renters. ‘‘Rates? Insurance? Building materials? Tradesmen’s hourly rates . . . ’’

None of the scaremongers said anything nearly as idiotic as Andrew King, who heads a lovelysounding group called the Property Investors’ Federation. He says: ‘‘A lot of tenants ironically actually like the letting fee.’’

He is wrong. He is so wrong, he must know it. His wild statement makes me wonder, why are we playing along with such a broken industry?

At the suggestion of mild and positive change, people like King shriek in horror. These are people who hold huge power over normal people’s everyday lives. When they catch even a whiff of change meant to clean up their broken industry, they threaten to throw their toys.

They seem to think running an ethical business is impossible, which is (once again) wrong.

We know Ma¯ ori have always had their own ethical and people-focused housing model with pa¯ . It still works. While the papaka¯ inga in Waikawa may be small, many ru¯ nanga have built big. Nga¯ ti Wha¯ tua O¯ ra¯ kei commercially operates a papaka¯ inga with more than 100 central Auckland homes. It wants to build more.

Ideas like this are worth getting behind. They offer a bright alternative to our current reality, in which we slowly battle for tenants’ basic rights and search for prime ‘‘first-home buyer’’ land. This can’t go on forever.

To Twyford, I ask: Why bother putting a plaster on a broken industry? Groups like Nga¯ ti Wha¯ tua, the Salvation Army and Wellington’s Dwell Housing Trust have already started the renters’ revolution.

The Government should ensure renters have an option of living in safe, affordable and enjoyable homes. The pa¯ model offers that and has the potential to give gluttonous investors a run for their money.

The pa¯ model has the potential to give gluttonous investors a run for their money.