17 March 2016

Sell-off drives community groups into arms of bankers

The Government’s shortlist of groups bidding to buy state houses is a secretive jack-up that has driven community groups into the arms of merchant bankers and offshore investors, Labour’s Housing spokesperson Phil Twyford says.

“The Government needs to come clean and tell New Zealanders how much these houses are being sold for – and how much valuable land and housing is going to end up in the hands of offshore financiers.

“National has tried up to dress up this sell-off as being about boosting the work of community organisations. To keep alive its deeply unpopular sale of publicly-owned land and housing, the Government is now forcing these groups into multi-million dollar deals with financiers.

“The whole process has been secretive, and the Government has not provided a scrap of evidence that the sell-off of hundreds of millions of dollars of land and housing will make life better for the tenants,” Phil Twyford say.

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