David Farrar: Kainga Ora slipping again

The Herald reports:

A woman’s 14-year-old grandson was nearly mowed down by her neighbour’s car, while her son was threatened with a machete.

Now an elderly Tongan woman has gone to the Tenancy Tribunal after Kāinga Ora refused to terminate her tenancy despite the woman living in “constant fear” of the family next door. …

David Farrar: The Kainga Ora turnaround

The change to Kainga Ora in the last two years has been massive. Chris Bishop has a long list of changes. Here are some of the bigger ones:

David Farrar: Observations from the Kāinga Ora Chair

Simon Moutter is the Chair of Kāinga Ora, formerly known as Housing NZ. He sent the e-mail below to a few acquaintances of his, and one forwarded it onto me. With permission, I am blogging it below because I think it is such a good and interesting read.

Matua Kahurangi: Taxpayer-Funded meth dens

It should come as no surprise to anyone that Kāinga Ora homes are riddled with meth contamination. When you hand out the cheapest rents in the country to society's bottom-dwellers, it’s only natural they’ll have more cash left over to blow on meth.

According to figures released under the Official Information Act, Kāinga Ora has blown $20.6 million of taxpayer money since 2020 decontaminating and repairing meth-damaged state houses. Millions spent on cleaning up after tenants who turned their government-funded homes into drug dens. Not a single one of them has paid a cent.

David Farrar: Another Kiwibuild success!

The Herald reports:

A group of 109 never-lived-in new homes in Auckland and Wellington are for sale from the Crown, which was contracted to buy them from private developers, who failed to sell their stock in a tough market.

The housing schemes all have an underwrite via KiwiBuild because previous Governments backed new schemes to boost supply by agreeing to bail developers out if they couldn’t sell.

Damien Grant: What to do with a problem like Kāinga Ora

I do like a good governmental annual report. They are interchangeable for the most part; shining faces smiling at other shining faces, all with wonderful teeth and enjoying a wonderful life thanks to the honest hard work of the Ministry for Administrative Development.

Mostly the faces are brown. It isn’t clear why but I suspect that many Wellington civil servants believe brown people would be living in cardboard huts and eating boiled cabbage without government assistance.

Ele Ludemann: Better use for scarce $s

A reporter asked me what I thought of the policy announcement for First Home Grants as I walked out of the National Party conference.

I said I lived on a farm so it wouldn’t affect me and walked on before she could press me.

My answer was wrong. Every policy using taxpayers’ money affects everyone to a greater or lesser degree – even if it’s just that money spent on one policy isn’t available to be spent on another.

Hon Chris Bishop: Minister Responds to Review of Kainga Ora

The Government has announced a series of immediate actions in response to the independent review of Kainga Ora – Homes and Communities, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says.

“Kainga Ora is a large and important Crown entity, with assets of $45 billion and over $2.5 billion of expenditure each year. It owns over 70,000 homes and is the country’s biggest landlord, providing accommodation to people often in great need. Its performance has a material impact on the Crown’s fiscal position,” Mr Bishop says.

Cam Slater: Labour Couldn’t Run a Bath

NZ’s Worst Landlord Woke and Broke

The review of Kainga Ora has been released and it shows without a shadow of doubt that Labour and anyone from Labour, couldn’t run a bath or anything else for that matter.

The report is damning and finds that the social housing system is not socially or financially sustainable.

Dr Eric Crampton: Despair - construction consenting edition

Kainga Ora is the government's house building agency. It's been building a lot of social housing.

Kainga Ora has its own (but independent) consenting authority, Consentium.

It's a neat idea. Rather than have to deal with building consents across each different territorial authority, Kainga Ora can run building consents, inspections, and Code of Compliance Certificates through Consentium.

David Farrar: Hehir on Kainga Ora

Liam Hehir writes:

Ronald Reagan said that the nine most terrifying words in the English language are “I'm from the government, and I'm here to help.”

Fast forward to present-day New Zealand and we have a new champion in the scary nine word category: “We're Kāinga Ora and we are your new neighbours.”

Heather du Plessis-Allan: Here's proof this Kāinga Ora crackdown is for the best

If you needed proof that the Government is doing the right thing by cracking down on unruly state house tenants-  here it is. Even Chris Hipkins is endorsing it now.

He's admitted today his Government should've done more to crack down on state house tenants terrorising their neighbourhoods.

And he’s said- “I have some sympathy for some of the changes that they’re making, there should be further consequences”.

John MacDonald: Let’s hope Kāinga Ora gets the message

There seem to be three main points of view when it comes to the Government’s crackdown on cruddy state housing tenants.

We’ve got some people living in Kāinga Ora properties saying they don’t think much will change because we’ve been too soft, for too long.