State House Vandals Cost Taxpayers Millions

Tuesday 28 Sep 2004

Deborah Coddington - Press Releases - Social Welfare

The Labour Government has forked out a whopping $43 million repairing tenant-damaged state houses, but only recovered a third of that sum since 2001, ACT New Zealand Associate Social Welfare Spokesman Deborah Coddington revealed today.

"Answers to my written Parliamentary Questions have revealed that between 2001-04, Housing New Zealand spent $42,886,181 fixing state houses damaged by tenants - yet only recovered $14,307,628 from those responsible for the vandalism," Miss Coddington said.

"This is a scandal of epic proportions. The Government should be sending a strong message to these tenants that such behaviour is unacceptable by seeking full, prompt payment from the perpetrators of this damage.

"Instead, Housing Minister Steve Maharey appears to condoning the vandalism by his failure to recover these debts. It's a disgrace that hard-working taxpayers - many of whom must rent or repay mortgages - are being forced to pay for the $28,000,000 shortfall.

"It's important to remember that most state tenants look after their property, and that - for the most part - the damage has been done by a small number of destructive residents. I call on Mr Maharey to stop mucking around and get tough with these ratbags without delay," Miss Coddington said.

ENDS

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Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>