Brash Says the Poor and Young Will Lose Under Auckland Council Plan
Thursday 29 September 2011, 2:48PM
By ACT NZ
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ACT Party Leader Don Brash today labelled the Auckland Council’s proposal to change the ‘Metropolitan Urban Limit’ into an even tighter ‘Rural Urban Boundary’ ridiculous and discriminatory, saying it would lock the young and the poor out of housing in Auckland for the next 30 years.
“The Auckland Council is effectively ensuring that unless people are wealthy, the Kiwi dream of owning their own home will always be out of reach. This will be a massive blow to a generation of Aucklanders trying to get ahead.
“Housing affordability for our young people is a real concern. They are the very people we are desperately trying to keep from abandoning New Zealand and this is just one more strong incentive we're giving them to leave,” Dr Brash said.
The new boundaries, which will ban urban development outside the rural-urban line, will see 75 percent of new housing over the next 30 years built within the existing already built-up areas, and Dr Bash says this could have a devastating effect on housing affordability.
“According to research by respected economist Arthur Grimes the existing limit has already made land immediately inside the MUL between eight and 13 times more expensive than land immediately outside the completely arbitrary line.
“It defies belief that instead of rectifying some seriously poor public policy, the Auckland Council is planning to make the situation worse. The ACT Party believes we should be introducing policy to make housing more affordable not less,” Dr Brash said.
Dr Brash identified the Resource Management Act as another huge nation-wide obstacle to housing affordability. He points out that, relative to incomes, house prices have doubled since the introduction of the RMA in 1991, and says that this staggering increase has seen home ownership decline in every census since 1986.
“A major priority for ACT in the next Government will be to make housing more affordable for all New Zealanders by eliminating arbitrary restraints on the availability of land for residential development” Dr Brash said.