Hon. Dr Nick Smith MP National Party Local Government Spokesman

03 December 2004

Holiday home-letting tax wrong, say Nats

"Councils should not be able to slap extra rates and charges on people who rent their homes out to holidaymakers," says National Party Local Government spokesman Nick Smith.

Dr Smith is responding to plans by the Queenstown Lakes District Council to require resource consents costing between $400 and $1800 for letting a home for less than three months, and a higher level of rates under the Resource Management and Local Government Acts.

The Real Estate Institute is considering a legal challenge to the new charges.

"The law should not allow councils to impose this new tax on renting out a holiday home. If this is allowed in Queenstown and Wanaka, we will soon have every council in New Zealand penalising the Kiwi bach owner for renting out their home to friends and family.

"The bureaucrats should butt out and accept that a Kiwi's home is their castle. Councils have no business interfering in who lives in one house, for how many nights or whether the rental is short term or long term.

"This attack on homeowners' rights is a product of the Government's new local government, rating and resource management laws. They give councils far too much scope to invent new rules and charges.

"National will review these acts and ensure homeowners' rights are protected from busybody bureaucrats," says Dr Smith.

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>>