Minister for Social Housing Paula Bennett. Photo / File

Govt puts extra $24m into social housing

Author: NZN,
Publish Date: Tue, 6 Sept 2016, 12:49pm

UPDATED 7.52pm The government is giving an extra $24 million to Auckland community housing providers as home prices continue to soar in the city.

As the average Auckland house price topped $1m on Tuesday, Social Housing Minister Paula Bennett said social housing providers were struggling with the same problem as everyone else.

"We know the property market is extremely tight in Auckland at present, and it is no different for those organisations helping to house our most vulnerable citizens," she said.

The funding is a top-up to the $120m in the 2016 budget for Auckland social housing.

"We need more one-and two-bedroom and large social houses and that is what we are targeting with this extra funding," Ms Bennett said.

Ms Bennett said it's part of a well thought out programme, and not an ad hoc response to a crisis.

"I've been working on it for 18 months. I just seems every time I do something everyone says it's ad hoc. If I didn't do anything I'm ignoring it and when I am doing something then I get criticisms for doing things too quickly."

The $24.4m will allow Community Housing Providers to take out grants of up to 50 per cent for the development of new social homes and will also give them an extra weekly payout on top of current subsidies for rent.

But Maori Party Co-Leader Marama Fox said whatever the Government is doing right now, add a zero and we will be somewhere near the figure that is needed.

"We need to add a zero to the number of houses that are being built. We need to add another zero to the emergency housing provision. We need to add a zero to every part of this Budget to ensure we do not have this problem in 20 years time."

Housing Minister Nick Smith has promised he won't rest until house price inflation is in single figures.

Dr Smith said a number of factors are at play, including the lowest mortgage rates in 60 years.

"New Zealand is doing well. Our population is growing strongly as New Zealanders are choosing to stay and more people coming from overseas here. As a consequence we need to pull out all stops on housing."