Auckland councillors in the dark over government’s housing intensification rethink

Source: Radio New Zealand

The housing minister has confirmed the coalition is taking another look at housing intensification plans in Auckland after pushback from critics.

Last year, Auckland Council approved the initial phase of a new plan to accommodate an extra 2 million new homes in the coming decades.

The move was in response to the government agreeing to let the council opt out of medium-density rules that apply to most major cities.

This was in exchange for setting up zoning for 30 years of growth, which Auckland Council went on to calculate as an extra 2 million homes.

The council’s Plan Change 120 set out the process for doing this, but the government has since come under pressure from proponents of heritage homes who have raised concerns about further intensification in character areas that were already seeing major development.

Housing Minister Chris Bishop confirmed to RNZ on Friday afternoon the coalition was now considering weakening housing intensification laws in a move that could decrease the 2 million figure.

“The government is considering a range of options around housing capacity targets for Auckland, and as minister of housing I will have more to say soon,” he said.

It was understood this would not affect housing intensification around major public transport hubs, like the Auckland City Rail Link (CRL) that is due to open later this year.

National under Judith Collins’ leadership originally supported the medium-density residential standards, but signalled a backdown under Christopher Luxon, who said changes were needed.

Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown said he had not had any direct contact with government ministers recently and certainly had not had any phone calls about scaling back intensification laws.

“Nobody in the government has rung me back and said we’re going to be taking this back… they’re leaking to the press down there in preparation for it, but nobody in the government’s rung me to say that they’re going to do that.”

Brown said he supported intensification and believed there had been “scaremongering and nonsense going on” around the 2 million homes figure.

“I still remain of the view that intensification, where we’ve got good public transport and all of the infrastructure in place already, makes sense.

“I think that some people have oversold the worry about things. The people in those suburbs which [are] apparently upset are already facing rules where every section can have three-storey houses right up to the boundary, which would be a lot worse for them than having a multi-storey one every so often.”

The mayor said he expected to be briefed on any updates when he saw government ministers later this month.

The council’s Policy, Planning and Development Committee chair Richard Hills said he had heard rumours of the government relenting all summer but had “no clarity at all” – and it was unclear how a change would fit into the consultation process.

“Unless you are spending millions of dollars on putting a new plan out again, I am not sure what the law change the government will be doing would enable… coming in halfway through a process without talking to us, again, leads to even more confusion.”

Another councillor, Christine Fletcher, welcomed the potential change as “the only sensible thing to do”, saying the 2 million extra homes approach was “blunt and ill-considered and it did not take into account physical and social infrastructure”.

“I think that the majority of Aucklanders will welcome this. There will obviously be some activists who will criticise the government… but slow and steady is the way to actually win this particular race.”

She said people were not opposed to intensification, but it had to be done properly.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand