“Winston Peters’ pitch to overturn Labour/National’s housing density laws shows he has nothing new to offer, ACT already has a plan to fix the housing mess ready to go,” says ACT Leader David Seymour.

“ACT already has a comprehensive and realistic policy to reverse these changes with National. Our Housing spokesperson and Deputy Leader Brooke van Velden was on Q+A this morning talking about them.

“We proposed at the time, and propose now, important changes to the law. The Medium Density Residential Standard should be replaced with Auckland’s Mixed Housing Suburban (MHS) zone. ACT put up this amendment when the law was debated last year, we still have it ready to go. We have a Member’s Bill before Parliament that would introduce a GST-sharing scheme.

“Winston has taken a year to even mention housing density. With nothing new to offer an unkind person might call him Winnie-the-wasted-vote.

“If people do vote for him based on this then he risks splitting the vote on Labour and National’s housing changes. He might need peoples’ votes but voters will be questioning whether they need him.

“He chose Jacinda Ardern as Prime Minister back in 2017 and he won’t rule out going with Labour again. It’s a bit like a burglar selling you home contents insurance.

“It’s easy to come out against bad policy a year down the track when the chickens are coming home to roost. It means more if you stand up for common sense and commit to resolving the problem at the start.”

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