Speaker 1: Yoda.
Speaker 2: I'm Chelsea Daniels and This is the Front Page, a
Speaker 2: daily podcast presented by the New Zealand Herald. On July
Speaker 2: fet a series of changes are due to be implemented
Speaker 2: by the government, and some of them will have a
Speaker 2: direct impact on your day to day. Notably, all rental
Speaker 2: properties in New Zealand must comply it with the Healthy
Speaker 2: Home Standards six years after that became law under the
Speaker 2: Labor Government.
Speaker 1: One labor law.
Speaker 2: Change hasn't survived, though that government's blanket speed limit reductions
Speaker 2: must all be reversed by Tuesday. Paid parental leave rates
Speaker 2: will also go up, while job Seeker support clients must
Speaker 2: now reapply for their benefit every twenty six weeks rather
Speaker 2: than fifty two, and the invest New Zealand agency designed
Speaker 2: to attract foreign investment is due to be set up
Speaker 2: by July first as well. It'll also be easier for
Speaker 2: kiwis to access contraceptives like IUDs, nutrition replacements will be
Speaker 2: fully funded for adults with Crohn's disease, and increase in
Speaker 2: some customs fees and goods levies crossing our border, and
Speaker 2: a new legal requirement to keep records of the movement
Speaker 2: of raw milk on and off farms. Later we'll dig
Speaker 2: into those more political changes and what they mean for
Speaker 2: you with Newstalk ZB political reporter Azaria Howe. But first
Speaker 2: on the front page ends at Herald property editor and
Speaker 2: Gibson is with us to explain what healthy home standards
Speaker 2: actually look like and can you took us through the
Speaker 2: five standards that must be in place by July.
Speaker 3: First is this is heating, insulation, ventilation, moisture, ingress and
Speaker 3: drainage and draft stopping. So the idea here is to
Speaker 3: make rental homes fit for purpose. So then moldy, they're
Speaker 3: not damp, they're not freezing in the winter, they're not
Speaker 3: boiling in the summer.
Speaker 2: What punishments await those landlords who haven't perhaps set up
Speaker 2: these standards in time.
Speaker 3: There's a seven thousand, two hundred dollar fine for breaches
Speaker 3: of the healthy home standards in the Residential Tendencies Act. Now,
Speaker 3: I have had a look at some tendency tribunal cases,
Speaker 3: and the tribunal can award exemplary damages to a tenant
Speaker 3: if they prove that the landlord had breached the healthy
Speaker 3: home standard.
Speaker 2: And how do you go about proving that?
Speaker 3: You have to make an application to the tribunal. I
Speaker 3: would think that initially the right thing to do, and
Speaker 3: I think this is prescribed to is you go to
Speaker 3: your landlord and you say, look, I need to be
Speaker 3: able to extract air when I'm cooking in the kitchen.
Speaker 3: We have showers, and we need to be able to
Speaker 3: get the steam out of the bathroom so the walls
Speaker 3: don't go black. There's a big gap under a door
Speaker 3: and the wooden blows in at night. You know, and
Speaker 3: talk to the landlord. Obviously, if the house is non compliant,
Speaker 3: I think the tenant should read the standards the published
Speaker 3: in great detail on Tendency Services website, and then I
Speaker 3: think if there is no resolution, make an application to
Speaker 3: the tribunal as a tenant and then go through all
Speaker 3: the aspects you'd have to list there how the house
Speaker 3: doesn't comply and how it doesn't meet the healthy home standards.
Speaker 2: What sort of homes or properties are exempt from this?
Speaker 3: There are exemptions, and these are cases where you couldn't
Speaker 3: make adjustments to make the property meet the standards. So,
Speaker 3: for example, if you're an apartment building and your kitchen
Speaker 3: is in the middle of a block and you couldn't
Speaker 3: ventilate from the kitchen, you might be exempt. So there
Speaker 3: are not that many exemptions. But let's have a look.
Speaker 3: So if you intend to demolish or substantially rebuild the
Speaker 3: property as a landlord, you don't have to comply. If
Speaker 3: you've already applied for a resource consent you don't have
Speaker 3: to comply. Or if it's part of a building that
Speaker 3: tenant doesn't own, exemptions might apply.
Speaker 2: You spoke with one multi millionaire landlord, Peter Lewis, the
Speaker 2: other week, and he didn't seem very impressed by those exemptions.
Speaker 3: Right well, Peter Lewis is an interesting person. He's been
Speaker 3: involved with the Auckland Property Investors and New Zealand Property
Speaker 3: Investors Federation for many years. He owns twelve rental properties.
Speaker 3: These are in South Auckland and in pokikok And he
Speaker 3: questions the standards now, he says, why don't the two
Speaker 3: million homes in New Zealand that you know, we have
Speaker 3: two million homes in New Zealand and most of those
Speaker 3: are owner occupied, why don't they need to comply? And
Speaker 3: he says he makes the study of going around New
Speaker 3: Zealand and looking at motels and he said they certainly
Speaker 3: don't comply. And then he questions what's going on with
Speaker 3: the approximately sixty three thousand people who live in retirement
Speaker 3: villages in New Zealand and says, why don't retirement village
Speaker 3: owners have to comply when in many cases residents are
Speaker 3: paying a million dollars in water buying to those properties.
Speaker 3: So he's got some good points, But I think overall,
Speaker 3: what the government was looking at here when this was
Speaker 3: when this came into law, was how could how could
Speaker 3: the lives of tenants be improved? And we know from
Speaker 3: many studies done that tenants suffer from health issues and
Speaker 3: a lot of those cases are to do with the
Speaker 3: type of properties that they're living in, so asthma, respiratory diseases,
Speaker 3: rheumatic fever, all those aspects. And so what the government
Speaker 3: was trying to do here was make rental properties fit
Speaker 3: for purpose and healthy.
Speaker 4: We have at the moment a current situation this his
Speaker 4: LANDLDS have to in twere nineteen seventy eight standard. Now,
Speaker 4: mister speaker, I remember growing up in the nineteen seventies.
Speaker 4: I remember seeing my breath in my bedroom. I remember
Speaker 4: ice on the inside of my windows. I remember a
Speaker 4: cold house and mister speaker, I think we can do better.
Speaker 2: So when the standards were first announced under the last
Speaker 2: Labor government, I remember how much of it ka faf
Speaker 2: for the idea seem to cause. Have landlords for the
Speaker 2: most part just gotten on with it.
Speaker 3: And well, that is a very good question, and we
Speaker 3: will only know when July one comes and if there
Speaker 3: is a number of cases that go to the tribunal. Now,
Speaker 3: I can't honestly believe myself personally that the homes that
Speaker 3: approximately twenty thousand Otago University students live in actually meet
Speaker 3: the standard, because I do spend a little bit of
Speaker 3: time and to need and every year, and I look
Speaker 3: at the homes there.
Speaker 2: And I've seen those videos.
Speaker 3: I wonder, and you know, our own Rachel Mail, one
Speaker 3: of our journalists here, wrote about the hell that she
Speaker 3: endured renting homes, and I wonder about all those houses
Speaker 3: in the Utow Valley in Wellington. I've lived in Mortimer
Speaker 3: Terras in Wellington and it was very cold and damp,
Speaker 3: and the properties that I lived in as a student
Speaker 3: were certainly would not comply with these standards. So it's
Speaker 3: a really good question. How many homes have been upgraded,
Speaker 3: how many meet the standard, but even more how many
Speaker 3: don't meet the standard?
Speaker 1: And you mentioned something about a two dollar coin.
Speaker 3: Yes, so if you get the edge of a two
Speaker 3: dollar coin, you can shove it into the gap between
Speaker 3: the window and the architrave, or the architrave and the
Speaker 3: door underneath or beside or whatever. That gap has to
Speaker 3: be sealed, so.
Speaker 1: That doesn't meet the standards. If that tiny.
Speaker 3: Doesn't meet the standard, the edge of a two dollar coin,
Speaker 3: and I mean I can stand in my kitchen and
Speaker 3: work out which direction the breeze is coming from. You know,
Speaker 3: a nineteen twenty six bungalow and devonport which I've owned
Speaker 3: for the last thirty years or so with my husband.
Speaker 3: I know it doesn't meet the healthy home standard, but
Speaker 3: we live there. We're not planning to rent it out.
Speaker 3: We seem to be relatively healthy. But I do acknowledge
Speaker 3: that there are many aspects of it that don't comply.
Speaker 3: And it's not just those sort of gaps. It's also
Speaker 3: trying to sell up the ceiling and the floor. So
Speaker 3: to get insulation into those places and to get fixed
Speaker 3: forms of hating is so important. You know, advice that
Speaker 3: can bring the living area up to a certain temperature
Speaker 3: and keep it. It's a pretty basic thing to ask for, right,
Speaker 3: Thanks for joining us in welcome.
Speaker 2: Now we turn to the political changes coming into effect
Speaker 2: with News Talk z be's Azaria Howe. So we've been
Speaker 2: hearing a lot about foreign investments since the start of
Speaker 2: the year. What role does invest in z have to
Speaker 2: play in that goal?
Speaker 5: Yeah, So Invest New Zealand, which is this new government department,
Speaker 5: opens its doors on the first of the month, so
Speaker 5: it's also the start of the new financial year.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 5: Just recently, actually legislation passed to formally establish that agency,
Speaker 5: Invest New Zealand, which is kind of trying to lure
Speaker 5: in international talent and bring some cash in to boost
Speaker 5: our economy, just a piece of what the government essentially
Speaker 5: calls its going for growth puzzle. Invest New Zealand has
Speaker 5: four main sort of goals, the first one being to
Speaker 5: drive investment into what they're calling high growth industries, the
Speaker 5: second being to connect investors with local businesses and research,
Speaker 5: the third being to support companies to grow their research
Speaker 5: and development in New Zealand, and the last but not
Speaker 5: least goal of New Zealand helping to build those skills
Speaker 5: for what they call a more innovative economy, so there's
Speaker 5: quite a big focus in terms of tapping into those markets.
Speaker 5: Trade and Investment Minister Todd McLay seems to be pretty
Speaker 5: confident about what that new agency can do.
Speaker 1: He is quoted as saying invest.
Speaker 5: New Zealand will act as a bridge between global capital
Speaker 5: and New Zealand's economic potential. He's also said it's about
Speaker 5: making it easier to do business here, cutting red tapes,
Speaker 5: speeding up that decision making and targeting investment that delivers
Speaker 5: long term benefits for the country. So essentially trying to
Speaker 5: hap into those markets a big piece of this, as
Speaker 5: well as that Golden Visa. It's worth noting there's been
Speaker 5: quite strong interest in that Golden visa.
Speaker 1: We call it a Golden visa.
Speaker 5: The actual name of it is the Active Investor Plus Visa,
Speaker 5: but I feel like golden visa is it's got a
Speaker 5: better ring to it. I suppose an Active Investor plus.
Speaker 5: But yes, within recent days the government confirmed more than
Speaker 5: one billion dollars. I'll say that again. One of the
Speaker 5: one billion dollars has been confirmed to be committed to
Speaker 5: New Zealand as part of that investment scheme, and a
Speaker 5: big chunk of it, more than eight hundred million dollars
Speaker 5: of that is from when the government changed those settings
Speaker 5: and hopes to sort of get more people and get
Speaker 5: more capital into New Zealand. Nikola Willis said it proved
Speaker 5: New Zealand's growth potential, essentially also giving a bit of
Speaker 5: a marker on how she would like to see the
Speaker 5: scheme progress. She was pointing to treasuries expectation of creating
Speaker 5: two hundred and forty thousand new jobs over four years
Speaker 5: and also said if you'd like to exceed that. So
Speaker 5: that's one will keep an eye on if that sort
Speaker 5: of investment scheme does bring in potentially more than two
Speaker 5: hundred thousand new jobs into the country.
Speaker 2: And also from July first, an increase to paid parental
Speaker 2: leave that's coming through up from seven hundred and fifty
Speaker 2: four dollars and eighty seven cents to seven hundred and
Speaker 2: eighty eight dollars and sixty six cents per week. Is
Speaker 2: this a standard adjustment the same way benefits tick up
Speaker 2: every year or is this government policy?
Speaker 5: Yeah, so this is quite a big part of the
Speaker 5: new financial year, and obviously we've celebrated the new year
Speaker 5: on January first, we've celebrated Matadiki and now it's time
Speaker 5: for another new year, that one being about the cash.
Speaker 5: Now Minister for Workplace Relations Brock van Dolden made that announcement.
Speaker 5: It's worth noting though it is part of this annual
Speaker 5: adjustment which aligns those sort of payments in terms of
Speaker 5: average earnings. So if the cash is going up, so
Speaker 5: as the payment people who are eligible can access these
Speaker 5: payments for up to twenty six weeks. And I thought
Speaker 5: it was quite interesting to see Brook van Velden saying
Speaker 5: it also applies to people who've experienced a miscarriage or
Speaker 5: a still birth, and it also applies to people who
Speaker 5: act as surrogates, So maybe for people who can't have
Speaker 5: their own children for medical or personal reasons, surrogates can
Speaker 5: also take time out of work to recover and sort
Speaker 5: of benefit.
Speaker 1: From that scheme.
Speaker 5: When announcing those changes, the Minister was quite hot on
Speaker 5: the economy. That was as we've previously said, it seems
Speaker 5: like quite a big focus, Brook van Velden said, and
Speaker 5: I quote, I acknowledge it continues to be tough for
Speaker 5: families right now, paiper and to leave is one way
Speaker 5: the government can help ease that pressure on the cost
Speaker 5: of living for families when they're away from work caring
Speaker 5: for children. So that is quite a significant announcement in
Speaker 5: something that comes in on the first of July. As
Speaker 5: we've said, it's also been a bit of a political topic,
Speaker 5: as most things are in campaign mode. The last election,
Speaker 5: Labor made a policy about this exact one, saying it
Speaker 5: would introduce four weeks of paid partners leave that could
Speaker 5: be taken with or after primary carers leave. The Greens
Speaker 5: also have been calling on wider eligibility criteria in terms
Speaker 5: of this policy, and it builds on previous policies from
Speaker 5: this government in terms of families and finance and things
Speaker 5: like that.
Speaker 2: Speaking of benefits, what's happening with regards to changes to
Speaker 2: reapplying for the job seeker benefit.
Speaker 5: Yeah, so people on that job seeker benefit will have
Speaker 5: to reapply for their benefit every twenty six weeks. Now
Speaker 5: it's currently fifty two weeks. And if that sounds familiar
Speaker 5: to you, it's because fifty two weeks is exactly one year.
Speaker 5: So Work and Income is essentially looking after the role
Speaker 5: out of this scheme. It says it'll check in more
Speaker 5: regularly to make sure people are getting the right support
Speaker 5: or finding and preparing for work when they're on that
Speaker 5: job seeker benefit, so seeking for a job. It also
Speaker 5: is promising that it will it will let people know
Speaker 5: when they need to reapply for that benefit. So it's
Speaker 5: expected people will get a notification about twenty five working
Speaker 5: days before they need to reapply for their job seeker
Speaker 5: But it is coming in a lot more regularly. That's
Speaker 5: because they want people to keep in touch with MSD
Speaker 5: in terms of what they're actually doing, how they're going
Speaker 5: to find a job, and maybe if they need more
Speaker 5: support or more help in terms of them chasing employment.
Speaker 5: There's also been a lot of changes in terms of beneficiaries,
Speaker 5: and I'm sure a lot of people would be aware
Speaker 5: of the benefit traffic light system, which has been quite
Speaker 5: controversial for some We talked about the big day, the
Speaker 5: budget day, budget twenty twenty five that kind of drew
Speaker 5: a line in the sand. One of the big headlines
Speaker 5: of that budget looked sort of a couple of years
Speaker 5: in the future, and this is not something that's coming
Speaker 5: on the first of July twenty twenty five. This is
Speaker 5: proposed for the first of July twenty twenty seven. From them,
Speaker 5: they are essentially looking to means test study jobs for
Speaker 5: people who are eighteen and nineteen years old, saying that
Speaker 5: they're going to put in place what is called a
Speaker 5: parental assistance test in the ENTRGUE criteria as well for
Speaker 5: the accommodation supplement also changing. So that is going to
Speaker 5: be an interesting debate as kind of the years go
Speaker 5: by as well in terms of the benefit.
Speaker 1: That is long to go before that takes place.
Speaker 5: But yes, from the first of July, people will have
Speaker 5: to reapply for that benefit every twenty six weeks.
Speaker 6: But economic growth also requires people to get from a
Speaker 6: to b as quickly and as efficiently as possible, and
Speaker 6: we certainly need to speed up produce getting to shops,
Speaker 6: We need to speed up export goods getting to ports,
Speaker 6: parcels getting delivered, and of course workers having shorter commuting
Speaker 6: times so they can get home to their families and
Speaker 6: spend more time at home with their families. I got
Speaker 6: to tell you, the previous government was great at saying
Speaker 6: no and slowing everything down across this country and across
Speaker 6: our economy. We are a government of action, and as
Speaker 6: I keep saying, we're a government of common sense, we're
Speaker 6: saying a lot less know and a lot more yes,
Speaker 6: and that's what this is actually about. So we're really
Speaker 6: pleased that we are literally literally accelerating New Zealand's economic growth.
Speaker 2: And the other big one is the reversal of Labour's
Speaker 2: speed limit reductions. Those are all going to be gone
Speaker 2: by July first. Why is the government so keen on
Speaker 2: getting rid of those changes kind of arbitrarily?
Speaker 5: Yeah, So this announcement was it's kind of been signaled
Speaker 5: for a decent amount of time, essentially in.
Speaker 1: A bid to speed up drivers.
Speaker 5: It was made in the wided upper and it was
Speaker 5: estimated that State Highway that being State Highway two between
Speaker 5: Featherstone and Marsterton, would speed up drivers by three minutes.
Speaker 5: Now that doesn't seem like a decent amount, but the
Speaker 5: government is saying this is for around ten thousand vehicles
Speaker 5: a day, mostly rate and things like that, and it
Speaker 5: is something that could speed up the economy. The government
Speaker 5: essentially had been against those speed limituctions from.
Speaker 1: The Labor Party.
Speaker 5: They're saying they were blanket speed limit reduction some places
Speaker 5: going down by ten twenty thirty kilometers an hour, and
Speaker 5: it seems like some motorists are not happy.
Speaker 1: The other piece of the coin.
Speaker 5: I suppose some road safety advocates also not happy about
Speaker 5: the speed limits going back up, but Transport Minister Chris
Speaker 5: Bishop is promising that safety has been taken into account. Essentially,
Speaker 5: Chris Bishop, when he's asked about the safety issues and
Speaker 5: those factors, he says the number one factor for road
Speaker 5: deaths is not speed, it's actually drugs and alcohol, which
Speaker 5: he is trying to make a big focus of the
Speaker 5: government's road safety plan. They're focusing on the rollout of
Speaker 5: these roadside drug tests in terms of hoping to bring
Speaker 5: those road deaths down, and they're essentially saying in terms
Speaker 5: of a lot of these roads they were actually at
Speaker 5: a higher speed limit, they were brought down and now
Speaker 5: they're being.
Speaker 1: Brought back up to what they were.
Speaker 5: It's also worth noting some of those blanket speed reductions
Speaker 5: were because they were in school zones and places like that.
Speaker 5: So it will definitely be an interesting one to see
Speaker 5: the impacts that that is going to have. But yes,
Speaker 5: it's been a bit of a political hot topic, as
Speaker 5: you'd expect, to be honest, in terms of speeding people
Speaker 5: up or slowing them down. It's always going to be controversial.
Speaker 5: With probably a half of drivers and the other half
Speaker 5: will feel the other.
Speaker 1: Way in Azaria.
Speaker 2: Do you think these changes are working with voters. I mean,
Speaker 2: the investment factor is particularly interesting. We've been hearing about
Speaker 2: that a lot. But is it getting to cut through
Speaker 2: with the general public.
Speaker 5: Yeah, so, I mean I suppose it's quite hard to
Speaker 5: say if it is resonating or not. I mean, there's
Speaker 5: been a few polls which have showed some different results,
Speaker 5: so it's not really one hundred percent clear if that
Speaker 5: is resonating. I think another thing is that people might
Speaker 5: have to sort of slow down in terms of the
Speaker 5: impacts of invest New Zealand. The ministers have sort of
Speaker 5: signaled that we're getting this money into the economy. We're
Speaker 5: trying to get these visas in, but it's something that
Speaker 5: might take some time. So sort of trying to get
Speaker 5: the cash into the economy, getting those jobs, sorting out startups,
Speaker 5: making those startups grow, bringing those startups into sort of European,
Speaker 5: American Asian markets, it could be quite a big task.
Speaker 5: Cost of living being quite a significant portion in terms
Speaker 5: of what the government is trying to tackle investment.
Speaker 1: Going for growth.
Speaker 5: The government has released this big Going for Growth plan
Speaker 5: and the investment is a big part of it. It'll
Speaker 5: also be interesting once we do find out the big
Speaker 5: names of the people who may have gotten these golden visas.
Speaker 5: That may change things and we'll see from there. But
Speaker 5: in terms of politics, there is still quite a way
Speaker 5: to go in terms of the next election and then
Speaker 5: the election after that. Obviously there's local elections relatively soon,
Speaker 5: but that is is going to have less of an
Speaker 5: economic focus.
Speaker 1: Thanks for joining us, Azariah, Thanks so much. It's been great.
Speaker 2: That's it for this episode of the Front Page. You
Speaker 2: can read more about today's stories and extensive news coverage
Speaker 2: at enzedherld dot co dot nz. The Front Page is
Speaker 2: produced by Ethan Sills and Richard Martin, who is also
Speaker 2: our sound engineer.
Speaker 1: I'm Chelsea Daniels.
Speaker 2: Subscribe to The Front Page on iHeartRadio or wherever you
Speaker 2: get your podcasts, and tune in on Monday for another
Speaker 2: look behind the headlines.