‘Unfair’ rents for tenants
A Christchurch social housing tenant is calling for an end to an ‘‘unfair and discriminatory’’ practice that sees him and hundreds of others pay more rent than neighbours living in the same complex.
Ernie Hall, 58, is one of about 1200 O¯ tautahi Community Housing Trust (O¯ CHT) tenants who pay, on average, 64% of the market rate.
Hall pays $275.80 in rent a week, but gets an accommodation supplement via Winz of $92, bringing his weekly bill down to around $183.
But another similar number of O¯ CHT tenants – about 1200 – pay just 25% of their income in rent, which means in nearly all cases their rental bill is lower.
Unlike Hall, they are eligible for an income-related rent subsidy, which sees the Government top up the rent to meet market rates.
The reason some are eligible for the subsidy and others are not is purely down to timing. Hall, who lives in Addington, and 1200 others, were Christchurch City Council tenants prior to 2016, when O¯ CHT was created. The others were taken on as new tenants after O¯ CHT was set up.
For Hall that means he is paying about $50 a week more in rent than some of his neighbours living in the same complex.
His weekly rental bill equates to about 48% of his supported living benefit – almost double the 25% paid by others.
Hall claims the disparity is deeply unfair, a claim backed by outgoing mayor Lianne Dalziel.
O¯ CHT manages about 2400 properties in Christchurch, Lyttelton and Akaroa, and provides tenancy services to about 2800 people.
The council created O¯ CHT to run its social housing so the trust could access much-needed extra revenue through the incomerelated rent subsidy. But only new tenants were eligible – not the council’s existing tenants.
Hall said he believed all O¯ CHT tenants should be on the same scheme.
‘‘This is clearly unfair, even discriminatory by the legal definition of ‘being treated unfairly or less favourably than someone else who is in the same or similar situation as you’.’’
Hall said this left many tenants paying up to and over 50% of their income on rent, which was ‘‘pretty much a definition of unaffordable housing’’. Hall also faced rent increases of up to 5% a year.
‘‘This leaves the Government knowingly enforcing an undeniably discriminatory policy, seemingly designed to cause ever-increasing hardship.’’
Dalziel said she believed the existing system was unfair. She said the council and the broader local government sector had asked the Government to change to a more equitable system.
‘‘The current system is unfair to some tenants because they pay more in rent than neighbours in similar circumstances.’’
Council head of sustainable city growth and property Bruce Rendall said if the council had continued to manage social housing,
‘‘This is clearly unfair, even discriminatory . . .’’ Ernie Hall
no tenants would have been eligible for the lower-income related rents.
‘‘O¯ CHT and council work hard to keep rents affordable for the remaining tenants, but without Government help are unable to address the unfairness in the system.’’
It appears the Government has no plans to change the rules.
A spokesperson for the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) said it was not appropriate to adopt a one-sizefits-all approach that enabled the income-related rent subsidy to be made available to all council housing.
HUD said the Government was focused on increasing the amount of new-build public houses to address the housing shortage.
Transfers of existing council housing to public housing reduced the number of new-build public houses that could be delivered, because income-related subsidy funding committed for additional homes was used for existing properties rather than new builds, the spokesperson said.
It also reduced the number of affordable rentals in the housing market, affecting people who were not eligible for public housing, the HUD spokesperson said.
O¯ CHT tenancy general manager Robert Hardie said rents are reviewed annually, and valuers carry out market rent reviews to establish the market rent.
‘‘Our homes are compared with other rental homes in the suburb, homes of a similar age, and assessed for improvements and size. This means rent changes vary across the city.’’
The trust has its own building programme and had added 229 homes since 2019.