Battle for state houses begins

Getting a state house in the current situation is like winning a lottery for tenants, Social Housing Minister Paula Bennett says.

Speaking on TVNZ’s Q+A programme on Sunday morning, Bennett said the Government’s plan to transfer a large number of houses to community housing providers would help change that.

She denied the move was an experiment, and said the transfer would mean more housing was available and tenants would have more choice.

The Government recently announced state houses in Tauranga and Invercargill would be the first sold off under the plan to transfer the homes to community housing providers.

Tauranga has 1250 Housing New Zealand houses, while Invercargill has 370. Those areas were picked because ‘‘we had to start somewhere’’, and Tauranga and Invercargill had stable demand.

In January, Prime Minister John Key announced that state house reforms would see up to 2000 state homes sold to ‘‘community housing providers’’ this year, as it cuts the number of state houses it owns by 8000 over three years.

Tenants were disadvantaged by the current system, Bennett said.

‘‘They almost have to win lottery to be at the top of the list and get a vacant house that becomes – particularly in Auckland – and a vacant house become available. We want to change that.’’

She also said the Government had ‘‘a number of excellent community housing providers’’ that had indicated they wanted to get into the market.

‘‘We’ve got iwi that are lining up and saying that they’re interested.’’

The houses would be sold at ‘‘less than the market value’’, Bennett said on Q+A.

Community housing providers who bought the state homes could go into partnership with a developer to turn the houses they had bought into more.

Private developers working with community organisations was not harmful, Bennett said. ‘‘I, in fact, see everybody winning out of that.’’

Vulnerable people would get a home that better suited their needs, with the Government looking to build 3000 more houses during the next three years, she said.