I suspect this is not the sort of endorsement that is actually helpful.
But a landlords’ organisation has told their members to hold off making their flats warmer and drier until after the election.
From Ben Leahy at the Herald:
Landlords should wait to see if National wins October’s election before spending money refitting their rentals up to new heating standards, a lobby group for property owners says.
The comments by the NZ Property Investors Federation have been labelled “deeply disappointing” by the Labour Party and questioned by the Real Estate Institute and the NZ Green Building Council.
The advice comes after National under new leader Judith Collins confirmed to the Herald it would tear up new Healthy Homes standards recently brought in by the Labour-led Government.
The standards require – from July 1, 2021 – that all rentals be fitted with insulation, heating and ventilation within 90 days of an existing tenant renewing their lease or a new tenant moving in.
Spokesperson Andrew King presents the proposal as giving tenants more choice.
King said he would personally install a heat pump straight away if his tenant wanted it and was willing to pay a higher rent because the tenant was the customer and needed pleasing.
Kris Faafoi’s response is typically blunt:
I would find it deeply disappointing if landlords were being given advice to hold off work that ensures they are providing safe, dry, healthy accommodation for fellow New Zealanders on the basis that a more malleable government might get into power and scrap basic standards that would see New Zealand’s poor track record on healthy housing vastly improved”.
The state of some of our rental properties is appalling and contributes significantly to adverse health and education outcomes for too many of our children. The greater good argument behind the reforms is overwhelming, or should be unless you are missing a heart.
Andrew King’s endorsement of National’s policies is actually doing the left a favour. He is clearly showing who is looking after the interests of landlords and the interests of ordinary people.
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