This week Labour released its housing report, so the 1 NEWS politics team hammered out the issues from Labour's big promises.
Katie Bradford, Andrea Vance and Corin Dann sat down this week to explore what the report means for New Zealanders.
The report, A Stocktake of New Zealand's Housing, by the Salvation Army's Alan Johnson, Otago Public Health Professor Philippa Howden-Chapman and economist Shamubeel Eaqub, was released on Monday.
"We know what the problem is, we didn’t need to do a report. It doesn’t butter your parsnips, it doesn't get things done. I want to know how they’re going to make KiwiBuild work because it’s still not clear to me," Ms Vance said.
"I want to know how they’re going to build 2,000 extra state houses."
Ms Bradford said Labour only went into the election promising 1,000, and Cabinet has not agreed to build 2,000 state homes.
"Phil Twyford does not have the support of his colleagues to build 2,000 extra state houses a year, I don't see that happening," she said.
Shamubeel Eaqub, one of the authors, had to hold his tongue this week when talking about the dire state of the Kiwi housing and rental market.
"I told the minister I wouldn't use this particular word I wrote down in my notes in terms of the state of the housing market now because what I wrote was that the state of the housing market is a cluster .... – you fill in the gap.
"Rents are going to rise very rapidly because we have screwed up so many different things when it comes to housing in New Zealand," he said.
Mr Eaqub believes the lack of housing in New Zealand is one of the main concerns for those looking to rent.
At present, 2000 extra elderly a year receive superannuation and accommodation benefit.
"That's creating problems. Obviously one of the assumptions in the past was with super that people over 65 would be mortgage free for instance. Issues around that are creating huge problems and just adding to that housing shortage," Ms Bradford said this week.
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