Speech: Little - Labour Party Congress
Andrew Little, Leader of the Opposition
Wellington, 14
May 2017
Delegates, we have four and a half months ahead
of us, and a great opportunity to give this country a fresh
approach:
• to make sure everyone has a decent place to
live;
• for hospitals that can treat everyone who turns
up for care;
• to give hope to young people looking for
work;
• to make our rivers clean again and take real
action on climate change and the environment.
Delegates,
the next four and a half months are a fight for a better New
Zealand, and for everyone in this magnificent country of
ours.
Delegates, we can do this. We must do this.
Thank you for devoting this weekend to the cause of
Labour and contributing so much to this year’s
election.
I acknowledge our President Nigel Haworth and
our General Secretary and campaign manager Andrew Kirton.
Thank you for the tremendous work you both do.
And, of
course, I acknowledge my Deputy Leader Jacinda Ardern.
Jacinda, thank you for the support you give me. Thank
you for your speech yesterday and the passion with which you
advocate for our children and young people. Thank you for
the policy you launched yesterday of health teams in all our
schools, which is just one of the ways we’ll bring a fresh
approach to our neglected mental health services.
To all
our MPs and candidates for Parliament – thank you; thank
you for putting yourselves forward, either again or for the
first time.
And – most important of all – to all of
our dedicated activists and organisers who are going to
sweep Labour to government on September 23rd. Thank
you.
I also want to take a moment to thank the Labour MPs
who are retiring from Parliament. All have served our party
and our country with distinction.
To Phil Goff, David
Shearer, David Cunliffe, Clayton Cosgrove, and Sue Moroney,
thank you for your service to Labour and to New Zealand. We
owe each of you an enormous debt.
I especially want to
pay tribute to Annette King.
Thank you Annette, for
everything you’ve done for everyone in this room, and for
the people of New Zealand.
Annette has been our rock. She
helped me lay the foundation for rebuilding the Party after
the last election.
Thank you, Annette, for your lifetime
of service to Labour. You are a titan of this great Labour
movement.
Of course as current MPs retire, Labour has an
impressive crop of new candidates ready to come to
Parliament after the election. They’ll be fantastic
MPs.
I’m especially proud of two things:
We’re
going to bring at least nine new, amazingly talented women
to Parliament as Labour MPs.
And, get this, after the
election, at least 1 in 4 Labour MPs will be Māori.
We
are going to have the largest representation of Māori MPs
of any party, ever, in New Zealand politics.
You know, it
was such a nice feeling to be introduced by Leigh before.
She has sustained and supported me in challenging roles over
many years, and I am hugely grateful.
I couldn’t do
this job without her.
Leigh and I have been together for
nineteen wonderful years. She’s my soulmate, and we have a
son who is our pride and joy.
We’ve lived the typical
Kiwi story in many ways.
Leigh and I met just after I
started working. We settled down, bought a house, started a
family, and got married – which is a very 21st century
order in which to do things.
Many of you will have a
similar kind of story to tell.
That first house we bought
in 2000 cost us $315,000. That wasn’t a small amount of
money for us, but it was manageable.
It got us a nice,
three-bedroom starter home, built on a hillside in
Wellington.
And, like any good Wellington house, it was
up about a thousand steps!
For Leigh and me, being able
to buy that first house gave us a measure of financial
security and certainty. More importantly, Ii It gave us a
sense of our own place.
It was the house we brought our
baby boy home to.
I remember that time vividly. Preparing
the baby room. And putting this precious bundle of humanity
in his cot for the first time. This tiny little thing, in
this ocean of sheets.
Of course, Cam’s nearly 6 foot
tall now. He doesn’t fit in the cot anymore!
The story
of our first home is a story told by thousands of Kiwi
families every day.
A place to call home.
A place to
raise your children.
The Kiwi dream.
It’s the
story Labour wants for every Kiwi family.
But let me tell
you something. We bought that house in 2000 for $315,000.
Now, it would cost around $830,000. It’s gone up by half a
million dollars in 17 years.
Its value has nearly
tripled.
But here’s the thing: Families’ incomes
haven’t tripled since 2000. Nowhere near.
That’s why
housing is getting further and further out of reach.
New
Zealand’s housing crisis - yes, crisis - is not just about
out of control prices. It’s about the insurmountable
barrier that many first home buyers now face. It’s about
the rapid increase in rent that tenants are seeing
now.
It’s about the disruption it is causing to the
education of thousands of children.
It’s about the fact
that what is happening with housing is now the main cause of
growing inequality and growing poverty in New Zealand
today.
You know, I was out door knocking in Mt Roskill
last year with Michael Wood. It was a typical Kiwi street,
modest family homes - sports gear in the front lawns and
washing lines out the back.
I knocked on one door, a
typical house, and I realised very quickly there were three
families living there. Not one family - three! It wasn’t a
big home; it was a modest home. I was gobsmacked by
that.
Then, the next door I knocked on, on the same
street, had the same thing. Multiple families crammed into a
house designed for only one.
And it wasn’t just one or
two houses on the street, it was house after house, all with
families packed in.
Delegates, that’s not the New
Zealand we want.
We can do better.
As Jacinda and I
travel the country doing public meetings, housing is the
number one issue people raise with us, every single place we
go.
You know, last Friday, I was in Hamilton with Nanaia
Mahuta, Jamie Strange and Brooke Loader. I met a woman there
called Shirley, and her daughter.
She lives on Jebson
Place, an area that was once a thriving state house
community. But, she told me, the current government has
gradually emptied out all the other houses.
Her community
is gone. She showed me what is left - a bunch of broken down
buildings, a haven for crime.
Shirley couldn’t
understand it. Why have they left those houses empty and
rotting in the middle of the housing crisis? She told me she
just wants her community back. She had tears in her
eyes.
So, I told her why I was there that day. I was
announcing that Labour will tear down all those abandoned
old buildings. And in their place we are going to build a
community of 100 affordable KiwiBuild and state houses – a
place for families, once again.
Well, you should have
seen Shirley’s face. She was beaming from ear to
ear.
Security, community, hope. That’s the difference
we will make up and down this country by building those
homes.
You know, that’s why I do what I do. That’s
why I come to work every day. I do it because when I meet
people like Shirley, or the people crammed into houses down
that street in Mt Roskill, or even look at my own son, Cam
and his mates, and wonder what the future holds for them, I
know we can and must do better.
And I’m damned well
determined to do something about it.
New Zealand urgently
needs some fresh thinking on housing.
Every Kiwi family
should have a place that they can call home.
And
everyone should have a shot at owning their own place.
So
here’s what we’re going to do.
The first thing is we
will build homes that families can afford to buy.
We will
lead the largest house building programme since Michael
Joseph Savage carried that dining table into 12 Fife
Lane.
We’ll use the money we get from selling the first
bunch of houses at cost to build more homes and sell them.
And we will keep on doing that - build, sell, build, sell -
helping more and more and more families buy a place of their
own.
But... building houses is just part of the answer.
The other part is dealing with those things that jack up
prices and put homes out of reach for so many.
If we want
to make sure all Kiwi families get a fair shot – that when
it comes to buying a home they have a level playing field
– we’ve got to get the speculators out of the way.
We
can’t let our homes be gambling chips anymore.
So there
are three things we’re going to do to level the playing
field:
First, we’ll ban overseas speculators from
buying existing houses. Simple as that. We’ll do that in
our first hundred days.
Second, we’ll make speculators
who flip houses within five years pay tax on their
profits.
Third, today I’m announcing Labour will close
the tax loophole that allows speculators to claim taxpayer
subsidies for their property portfolio.
Right now,
speculators can take losses from their rentals and offset
that against their personal income. It allows them to avoid
paying tax.
This loophole is effectively a hand-out from
taxpayers to speculators. It gives them an unfair advantage
over Kiwi families.
So I’ll tell you.
We will close
the loophole. It is over.
Families don’t deserve to
have the odds stacked against them by their own government.
They deserve a fair shot. With Labour that’s what
they’ll have.
Now, let me be clear. This isn’t about
the mum and dad investor who has bought a rental as a
long-term investment. The vast majority of them don’t use
this loophole. Those that do will have time to
adjust.
This policy is about the big speculators who
purchase property after property. It’s about those big
time speculators who are taking tens of thousands of dollars
a year in taxpayer subsidies as they hoover up house after
house.
I say to people who would defend these loopholes
- how can we as a society possibly defend handing out
subsidies to property speculators when most young couples
can’t afford to buy their first home.
You ask me whose
side I’m on? It’s families. It’s first home
buyers.
Removing the speculators’ tax loophole will
save taxpayers $150m a year once fully implemented.
Now,
Grant, before you get too excited about Treasury getting
that money - I’ve got plans for it!
Today, I’m also
announcing Labour will invest those savings into grants for
home insulation and heating.
Homeowners and landlords
will be able to get up to $2,000 towards the cost of
upgrading insulation to modern standards or installing
heating.
Over a decade, we’ll help make 600,000 Kiwi
homes warmer, drier, and healthier.
This is a perfect
complement to my Healthy Homes Guarantee Bill that requires
all rentals to be up to a standard where they are fit to
live in.
40,000 kids a year go into hospital in New
Zealand for illnesses related to living in cold, damp,
mouldy homes. We’ve got to change that. We can do better.
And Labour will.
That’s the fresh, new approach
we’ll bring to housing.
We will build affordable
homes.
We will level the playing field.
We’ll make
our homes healthy, warm and dry.
You know, National’s
had nine years to tackle the housing crisis. And they have
failed at every step.
I’m telling you now, where
they’ve failed, we will succeed.
Why have we made
getting housing right such a priority?
Because it is
absolutely essential to New Zealanders’ sense of security
and stability.
Home is about “our place.” It’s a
place of celebration; a place of refuge. A launching pad to
face the day’s adventures and challenges. It’s our
landing spot to rest and get ready for the next day. It’s
where life is lived. Where futures are dreamed.
Without a
place to call your own, it’s hard to have any of these
things. To thrive, to prosper, to stand on our own two feet,
every New Zealander needs to have a place they can call
theirs.
It is Labour’s mission to restore the
foundation stone to strong families and strong communities
– decent housing.
I’ve focused on housing so far
today, but the same values that make housing such a priority
underpin everything else Labour does.
We are putting
people first.
That’s why we’ll fund our health system
so people get the care they need, and not just the care they
can afford.
That’s why Labour is facing up to the
crisis of neglect in mental health.
And that’s why
we’re going to have an education system that has what it
needs, and that prepares our young people for the future of
work.
Labour has so many fresh ideas for New
Zealand.
We’ll ensure the Government buys Kiwi-made to
keep work here and invest in regional
infrastructure.
We’ll get young people off the dole and
into jobs improving their communities and the environment. I
am committed to lifting wages and improving work rights,
especially for lower income workers.
We’ll make our
rivers cleaner and tackle climate change.
Through all
these policies and in every decision, Māori will be at the
table. Māori aspiration sits at the core of Labour’s
vision for New Zealand.
Because we are a progressive
party - we stand for a better future for each generation; we
think ahead; we invest in the future.
We are a party of
great passion - for our people, for ideas that make this a
more perfect country.
You know, the election in September
will be about who’ll invest in New Zealand’s future.
It’s not about the lolly scramble we’re seeing in this
year’s Budget.
This election will be about who has the
vision, the guts, and the plan to build a better New Zealand
that puts people first.
The answer is: Labour
does.
Only Labour will build the houses.
Only Labour
will reverse the health cuts and boost funding for GP visits
and mental health.
And only Labour will make tertiary
education and training fees free for three years.
In
Labour, we have the vision, we have the guts, and the
plan.
I’m here because I believe that all our people
should have a fair shot at the Kiwi Dream.
I believe
that, just as Norman Kirk said so memorably, we should all
have "Someone to love, somewhere to live, somewhere to work
and something to hope for”.
I’m here because I
believe that a government that puts people first is at the
heart of making that vision a reality.
I’m here to help
build a better New Zealand.
But, before we get that
opportunity to help build that better New Zealand, we’ve
had to build a better Labour Party.
We’ve had to build
a party that is ready to win, to govern, to lead.
As I
look out at this Congress, today, I know we have achieved
that.
We’ve done it by working together.
We have
built a dynamic, modern party.
We have packed out halls
and pubs around the country with ordinary Kiwis, keen to
hear our vision. Keen to support our plan.
We have built
a strong relationship with the Green Party to show that
there is a stable alternative government, ready to
go.
And because of all that, we’ve been winning. In the
local elections. In Mount Roskill. In Mount Albert.
You
know, by the time of the Mt Albert by-election, National had
stopped even bothering to show up!
Our Party is in
amazing shape.
We have a fantastic caucus, amazing new
candidates, a huge army of volunteers, and hundreds of
thousands of Kiwis signed up as supporters.
Labour is
ready to win in 2017.
This election is ours to win. All
over the country, people are telling me they’re ready for
a change.
To make that happen, we need much more than
politicians on a stage.
Ours is a community movement.
It's powered by people like you.
Mums and
Dads.
Students and teachers.
Workers and
families.
You and me.
Our movement wins when we bring
thousands of committed people with us.
I wouldn't want it
any other way.
New Zealanders have a clear choice at this
election.
We can choose a tired government that has run
its course.
Or we can choose a new, positive vision for a
better New Zealand.
This isn't going to be an easy fight.
It's going to be close. It's going to be tough.
I've
faced tough fights before, and this is one fight we simply
have to win.
Here's my message to New Zealanders this
year:
It’s time for a fresh team with energy and
passion.
It’s time for new ideas on housing.
It’s
time to give hope to our young people.
Vote for a better
New Zealand.
Vote Labour.
Delegates, let’s do
it.