‘That’s what I want to change’: Government on low Pacific home ownership

The National-led coalition government is committed to helping Pacific communities, and all New Zealanders, achieve their home ownership dreams.

In the 1980s more than half of Pacific households lived in homes they owned, but by 2018 that figure had plummeted to just 21 percent - Māori are at 31 percent and New Zealand Europeans at 60 percent.

When asked by William Terite on the 531pi breakfast show Pacific Mornings whether future Pacific generations would be consigned to being long-term renters, Housing Minister Chris Bishop said: “Well, that's certainly the status quo at the moment, but that's what I want to change."

Bishop said rent has a place in the New Zealand housing mix, but “ultimately you want people to be able to achieve their dreams”.

“I don't know many people who want to rent for their entire lives," he said.

“Most people, and Pacific people would be part of this too, want to ultimately move into a place that they can call their own that they have some stake in, that they have an ownership in.

“A lot of people would look at the rental market or the property market and say, well, I'm just condemned to a life of paying extremely high rents and I can't ever get into a home and I want to change that."

Watch full interview with Housing Minister Chris Bishop

“We used to be a property owning democracy, and increasingly we aren't. That, and the housing crisis affects all of New Zealand, but it particularly affects some groups more than others, Pacific peoples would be one of them."

When asked whether New Zealand needed to return to policies of the 1960s and 70s which allowed families to cash in their family benefits for their home deposit and low-interest government loans, Bishop said those ideas are “raised with me a little bit”.

“I think things have changed a lot since the 80s, including in the financial system, but we are looking at a whole range of housing support products that the government provides.”

“We spend as a government about $5 billion a year on housing products, whether it's income related rents or the accommodation supplement or progressive home ownership.

“There's a whole range of different schemes out there run through multiple different government agencies. Some of them are effective, some of them are not quite so effective, and so we're having a good look at them more.

“The focus is on what's the best bang for buck because ultimately it's taxpayer's money, so what's the best value for money investment that we can get? What's the thing that lists supply? Because ultimately it's all about supply, whether it's rental or accommodation for people to buy.”

Bishop said there is real deprivation across the rental spectrum.

He said Pacific and Māori disproportionately suffer more than most due to rental stress, with too much of their weekly paychecks being spent on rent.

“So housing for Pacific people was something we need to work on, like it is for every other ethnic group in New Zealand,” said Bishop.

“We've got a housing crisis and we need to fix it.”

On 4 July, the coalition government announced six major changes intended to boost housing growth in New Zealand:

• The establishment of Housing Growth Targets for Tier 1 and 2 councils

• New rules requiring cities to be allowed to expand outwards at the urban fringe

• Strengthening the intensification provisions in the National Policy Statement on Urban Development (NPS-UD)

• New rules requiring councils to enable mixed-use developments in our cities.

• The abolition of minimum floor area and balcony requirements.

• New provisions making the MDRS optional for councils.