Source: Radio New Zealand
Housing Minister Chris Bishop. RNZ / Marika Khabazi
The housing minister says nothing has fundamentally changed as the government scales back Auckland’s minimum housing target even further.
Auckland Council had been progressing a plan to accommodate up to 2 million homes in the next 30 years. But in February that was reduced to 1.6 million, and on Tuesday that dropped again to 1.4 million homes.
The council opted out of medium-density rules that apply to most major cities on the proviso it set up zoning for 30 years of growth, instead adopting its own process called Plan Change 120. RNZ previously reported this approach was made under pressure from proponents of heritage homes, who raised concerns about further intensification in character areas that were already seeing major development.
Chris Bishop told Morning Report on Wednesday 1.4m was the new legal minimum, but with upzoning around the City Rail Link (CRL) stations and other areas, officials were expecting to settle closer to 1.6m.
“We’re just making sure we can get some certainty into the Parliament and into the community. And I think hopefully – he says, crossing his fingers behind his back – that this will settle the issue once and for all… Nothing’s actually fundamentally changed. It’s still the same process. And actually, what Auckland Council’s doing right now, they can just charge on with because there’s no actual change to any of that.”
In response to a suggestion it was a “bit confusing”, Bishop responded: “Yeah, well, tell me about it.”
“On the margins, the 1.4m will allow the council a bit more flexibility, but I’m told that with all of the legal requirements around the national policy statement, urban development, rapid transit stations, for example, and the CRL, that the practical effect will be the council ends up at about 1.6m, which is a big improvement on the status quo and will make a significant difference to housing and development opportunities in Auckland, which is ultimately what I’m trying to achieve here.”
He said much of the debate around PC120 last year was “not exactly that helpful”, and the original target of 2m homes “became a bit of a lightning rod”.
“Everyone wants Auckland to grow, but we want to make sure it grows in the right places. We want to make sure that there’s a social license and community consensus around density. There’s no point having endless debates without making a lot of progress. And so that’s what I’ve been focused on, actually making progress.”
As for which suburbs might see less or more development under the latest plan, Bishop said that was up to Auckland Council.
“Having made this decision, we are now kicking the issue into Auckland Council’s hands and saying, ‘It’s now over to you. You wanted more flexibility over the medium density standards, we’ve given you that. You wanted to take the number down, we’ve given you that. It is now over to you and Auckland communities and constituents and councillors to work out exactly where density in Auckland happens.’ So it’s now over to the council…
“And 1.6m is a big advance on the current Auckland plan, the Auckland Unitary Plan, which is about 1.2m. So we are making progress in Auckland.”
Mayor Wayne Brown. RNZ/Marika Khabazi
Mayor Wayne Brown said in a statement on Tuesday the change would give Auckland more flexibility to grow into the city it wants to be, “a global city, not embarrassingly the world’s biggest suburb”.
“This has been going on for years, over successive governments. If we waited for everyone to agree, we’d never get anywhere. It’s time to stop the talk, for Wellington to get out of the way, and let Auckland get on with building Auckland.”
He also noted it would give greater ability to downzone for natural hazards and retain intensification where it makes the most sense, such as along major transport routes and the CRL.
National’s coalition partner ACT wanted fewer homes built if they were not going to be greenfields developments.
“The council has said they don’t want to do that. I think that’s really disappointing. They’ve said that they want most development to be within 10km of Queen Street,” leader David Seymour said.
“That’s their right and their choice as a council, but it’s also caused a change in the target number that the government has set.”
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
