KiwiBuild exposes taxpayers to risks
Judith Collins - Housing and Urban Development
2 August 2018
The KiwiBuild mess continues to grow with a major construction company building KiwiBuild houses going into receivership this week, putting the Crown further at risk, National’s Housing Spokesperson Judith Collins says.
“Five weeks ago, Housing Minister Phil Twyford
announced that new state, market and KiwiBuild homes were to
be built on the Northcote Development in Auckland.
“But yesterday building company Ebert Construction, which was due to commence work on the Northcote Development, went into receivership raising questions about what happens next.
“This is not the only construction company to
go under this year and it probably won’t be the last. This
leaves private and government-backed housing developments
vulnerable and raises real questions about how robust the
KiwiBuild due diligence process is and how vulnerable
taxpayers are to risks and cost blow outs associated with
failed developments.
“While Mr Twyford has been busy
reannouncing housing developments and rebranding private
builds as KiwiBuild homes to try and meet his targets he’s
neglected to get his head around crucial details including
official advice that he’s exposing taxpayers to real
risks.
“Mr Twyford’s own Cabinet paper states the
Crown has to take on some risk for the KiwiBuild programme
but last week Mr Twyford claimed it doesn’t and that all
those risks will be borne by the developers. Which is true?
Given Mr Twyford’s track record of getting things wrong
I’m going with his officials.
“If the Crown is
using tax payer money to share the risk with KiwiBuild
developers and the developer goes broke, who will ensure
sub-contractors and workers are paid?
“I think
it’s fair enough to say we won’t be seeing many
KiwiBuild houses ready for young families to move in any
time soon. Mr Twyford had nine years to come up with a plan
and it looks like he still hasn’t done his
homework.”
ends