Phil
TWYFORD
Housing Spokesperson

12 September 2014 MEDIA STATEMENT
More ghost houses from National

The Government’s desperate pre-election announcement of more ghost houses won’t fool Aucklanders wanting action on the housing crisis, says Labour’s Housing spokesperson Phil Twyford.

“These are ghost houses, to go with National’s ghost tax cut. Families cannot live in ghost houses, they need real affordable homes.

“Yet today there is another press release from Nick Smith promising thousands of houses that may or may not be built at some time in the future.

“The fact is that after six years in office – and 15 months after National announced the Housing Accord – they are now scrambling to move the first family into a completed home in one of the Special Housing Areas before the election.

“Nick Smith doesn’t like to admit it but only about 20 building consents have been issued in the Special Housing Areas, and most of them at Weymouth. There are few signs of activity in any of the other special housing areas.

“The numbers are so underwhelming, the Government is a month late issuing its quarterly report on the Special Housing Areas – leading you to wonder if they have shelved it until after the election.

“Auckland needs 39,000 new homes over three years. All National can do is draw lines on a map and call them special housing areas. They refuse to actually build the large volume of affordable homes people desperately want.

“Labour will build 100,000 real affordable homes that people can live in. We will also reform the planning rules, crack down on speculators and reform monetary policy to bring interest rates down,” Phil Twyford says.

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