The Resource Management (Enabling Housing Supply & Other Matters) Amendment Bill reaches over the shoulders of local councils and shifts local planning rules for housing - to ease greater housing density.
Especially for “tier 1” councils in Auckland, Hamilton, Tauranga, Wellington and Christchurch.Megan Woods described its intent as dealing “with one of the barriers to boosting housing supply: overly restrictive council planning laws”.
Housing in Mount Victoria, Wellington. Photo: RNZ / Dom Thomas
The thing that is unusual about this bill is that it is a joint policy approach negotiated between Labour and National and jointly announced.
So the debate was also different with typical foes applauding each other’s collegial approach, even complimenting each others’ debating style.
Agreement across the house on bills isn’t unusual. It happens pretty much every day. But not usually on big policy initiatives like this one, and even less often as a pre-agreed joint approach. On most marquee policies the major parties occupy widely variant trajectories, determined by differing world views, philosophies and the needs of variant audiences.
The details
This was a first reading and the environment select committee has already put the call out for public submissions on it. With that in mind you might want a little more detail.
The first thing the Bill does is speed up and intensify the planning directions already outlined in the National Policy Statement on Urban Development. Councils will be able to open up areas for development under a fast track process without significant delays for appeals and reviews. That policy area is probably less likely to engage most submitters.
Labour MP Megan Woods in the House Photo: ©VNP / Phil Smith
The second area is more likely to delight or outrage the wider public. There are a few aspects to this. I will let Minister for Housing, Megan Woods outline them.
“Tier one councils will need to change their planning rules so most of their current and future residential areas are zoned for medium density housing.”
National MP Nicola Willis described these medium density zones as "the right to build zones". She’s not wrong - the Bill stipulates what is allowed by right in a medium density area.
Megan Woods said that under the Bill “people can as of right build up to three homes of up to three stories on up to 50 percent of most sites without the need for a resource consent. Currently, most council planning rules may only allow for one home of up to two stories.”
“A wider range of housing types will be supported, including additional units for extended family living and those popular with first-home buyers, as well as bigger and higher homes than under current plans.”
“It also reduces the need to get a resource consent when building, extending, or renovating a home, making it quicker, cheaper, and simpler for people to do work on their own home.”
There is also a major change aimed at making this more possible in the narrow sections that often predominate in inner cities.
“The Bill states buildings must not project beyond a 60 degree recession plane measured from a point six metres vertically above ground level along all boundaries. This has been done to ensure three stories can be built on a variety of site sizes, something that has not always been possible in existing medium density zones.”
Recession planes are imaginary air boundaries that councils enforce to stop people blocking their neighbours’ sun. In most council plans they are currently significantly more restrictive than that new rule.
National Party MP Nicola Willis in the General Debate Photo: ©VNP / Phil Smith
What it doesn’t do
Speaking for National, Nicola Willis preempted some likely objections:
“I acknowledge the concerns of some …and I want to address those. First of all, there will be design standards. Nothing in this bill changes anything in the Building Act. These homes will be required to be of the same quality currently required.
“Second, there are sensible development requirements in this bill, and, for those who are ignorant of that, I encourage you to look at Part 2, which sets out in quite clear detail the parameters in which new development can occur, including things like having a 50 percent site coverage maximum.
“Third, this bill does set out qualifying matters, which councils will be able to demonstrate in order to exempt some areas from development, whether for environmental or heritage reasons. The difference is: whereas at the moment councils have carte blanche to do that—just about—this bill will require them to prove why that is necessary and to set that out. The burden of proof has switched.”
The light between parties
All the parties were in favour of this legislation at the first reading other than ACT. David Seymour spoke against restrictive zoning in general, but also decried the lack of more restrictive zoning rules in this bill. His party’s preferred approach may become clearer in the Select Committee process.
If he has identified an issue that creates light between his own party and National would that be termed a ‘political recession plane’?
