Greens want new standards for rental properties

Saturday 24 July 2010

The Green Party is looking to impose more costs on landlords by having minimum standards for insulation and heating in rental properties.

By The Landlord

Green Party MP Gareth Hughes has drawn up the Warm Healthy Rental bill and will try and get it through parliament.

"Everybody deserves warm healthy homes; it's only fair. My Warm Healthy Rental bill will ensure that all New Zealand's rental homes meet basic standards for warmth and insulation by 2018," he says.

Hughes is the Green Party Housing spokesperson and is currently promoting the bill to students.

He says the majority of the 1.6 million occupied houses in New Zealand do not have sufficient levels of insulation or efficient clean heating devices and a significant proportion do not meet World Health Organisation guide lines for adequate internal temperature.

"Adequate housing is an essential that all New Zealanders should be guaranteed. We know that there are a lot of cold damp rentals out there and that lots of people have to live in them because they don't have the money to move.

"This policy will not only protect people's health, it will protect the planet by lowering emissions from energy production.

"Landlords will benefit by having the value of their properties increased when they insulate them, and it will encourage them to take advantage of the $323 million home insulation scheme that the Greens set up.

Further information

Energy Efficiency Conservation (Warm Healthy Rentals) Amendment Bill - http://www.greens.org.nz/bills/energy-efficiency-conservation-warm-healt...

Retrofit interventions to enable healthy living conditions in existing New Zealand houses, EECA http://www.eeca.govt.nz/node/8663

Comments from our readers

On 26 July 2010 at 10:59 am aileen cutting said:
referring to the above, I do everything to keep my rentals in a good condition be maybe the greens should pass a bill to make tenants keep up their end of the bargain, its okay shooting the l/ord every chance they(anyone)has but one should look at the other end of the scale, tenants good and bad, theysign the paper to keep house ventialte,clean and damp free, do they no.
On 26 July 2010 at 11:02 am aileen said:
Its a good ideal, but not all insutlation comes under the scheme , if one goes of the natural eco friendly that does not get covered by the scheme also why plentise the l/lord by pushing to get floor/ceiling done when he/she could only probably afford to do the ceiling - answers to this question by the greens would be great
On 27 July 2010 at 8:54 am Mark, Napier said:
The reality is that all these things cost (even after any subsidy). So if the Greens REALLY want this, then they must also support removal of rent control (i.e. removal of income-related rents on the part of Housing NZ, which is the biggest influencer of market rents.
On 27 July 2010 at 2:33 pm Tony said:
Fancy Pant ideas ,not bad coming from a bunch of no-hopers who were caught gouging the NZ taxpayer with their secret property trusts.
On 6 September 2010 at 11:32 am Mandi Jane POvey said:
It would be great to have all homes insulated from top to bottom - far easier in theory than practise. The greens need to take a broader look at the whole issue in its entirety,private landlords provide a service that is paramount to the lower socio-economic community, and if private landlords started to pull out of the rental industry because of high ongoing costs due to legislation - where would this leave these people... with nowhere to live??? "slum" or "bad" landlords seem to be few and far between and most do show concern for the tenants and the environment they are providing, in my area anyway. A great idea if its well subsidised and thought through sensibly.
On 10 September 2010 at 5:34 pm Linda said:
I think only house rented to those on very low incomes qualify for the subsidy not all tenats are low income earners.
Commenting is closed

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