The government is fed up with councils taking the piss on housing
An artist's impression of councils' piss-taking apparatus, and Chris Bishop (; design The Spinoff)
They've built aqueducts for the piss. A state-of-the-art municipal pipe network purely for transporting the piss.
Chris Bishop started his speech at the Wellington Chamber of Commerce on Wednesday paying tribute to an unlikely list of allies. Labour's Phil Twyford deserved 'great credit' for pushing through the pro-housing National Policy Statement on Urban Development in mid-2020. Wellington City councillor and Green Party candidate Rebecca Matthews had the commitment and tenacity to push for a district plan that 'actually supports and enables growth' over the despairing cries of independent commissioners who spent several thousand words arguing a train is not a train .
But when it came time to talk about local government at large, the mood soured. It was 'inarguable, and sometimes uncomfortable' that councils had been one of the largest barriers to housing growth in New Zealand, Bishop said. To say they'd dragged their feet on following government instructions to zone for more apartments and townhouses was 'an understatement'. The minister didn't state it outright, but a sophisticated analysis of his speech by The Spinoff has revealed a clear message: councils have been absolutely taking the piss on housing.
The NPS-UD, which called for local governments to allow apartments around rapid transit, was passed in 2020. Its successor, the MDRS, which ordered them to zone for up to three townhouses on almost every residential section, was passed in 2021. Several councils have spent large chunks of the years since drilling boreholes to access reservoirs of the piss. Building aqueducts for the piss. Constructing municipal pipe networks entirely for transporting the piss. Image: Getty Images/Tina Tiller
The most elaborate systems have been developed in our two largest cities. Auckland, when faced with instructions to upzone places with good access to the city centre and rapid transit, spent months creating a bespoke, legally adventurous system to prevent any development near the villas with good access to the city centre and rapid transit . Its efforts to enshrine 'special character' areas in amber were so clearly contrary to the spirit of the law that one Labour MP who helped write the MDRS spluttered incredulously over the phone when talking about them, repeating 'it's just something they've made up', and 'I don't know where they've dreamed it up'.
After spending all its time checking the 'architectural integrity' of renovated villas rather than looking at actual barriers to development such as flood risk, Auckland Council complained it had been forced to upzone flood-prone areas and asked for an extension on implementing the law. Bishop, presumably after giving a sigh like a tomb door swinging open, granted its request .
Even these efforts fall short of the creative piss extraction and transportation technology on display in Christchurch, where in 2022 the council pioneered a novel approach to democracy and political authority by simply voting not to follow the law . It followed that with an attempt to introduce new development restrictions on all residential sites to ensure access to the city's special sunlight. Christchurch residents have proved resistant to other regionally specific lawmaking, such as my proposal to tax Aucklanders at a reduced rate to offset the city's high cost of living.
Through all of this, council planners have continued to deny developments for myriad creative reasons , including insulting the memory of trains that didn't exist, compromising motorway drivers' connection to a small hill, or sullying the heritage value of a Mobil station and a carpark.
Even several councillors spoken to by The Spinoff conceded their colleagues have been too focused on harvesting water, bodily waste, salt and electrolytes. 'Yes we have taken the piss,' said Christchurch councillor Andreij Moore. His council hadn't acted strategically. '[We] tried to object to intensification everywhere we possibly could and delay as many years as we could.'
Auckland councillor Shane Henderson was initially reluctant to make the same admission, but folded after being furnished with some specific examples. 'OK look, they have been taking the piss in some ways, but it's getting better. Attempting to put heritage protections on a gravel pit on K Rd is definitely taking the piss,' he said. He quickly remembered another example. 'OK I'll also contend that putting special character protections on a vast majority of several city-area suburbs is also taking the piss.' Henderson was then reminded about the complicated system his council developed to assess those 'character' areas. 'Yep, taking the piss, I agree,' he said.
It's clear that Bishop has had it up to here with all this. 'Yes,' he replied In response to a direct, on the record, yes or no question from The Spinoff on whether councils have been taking the piss on housing. In recent months, he's rejected Christchurch council's proposed special sunlight housing exemption, and asked Auckland Council to please for the love of God finally upzone around the City Rail Link that it and the government have just spent nearly $6 billion on. The Spinoff responded with the thumbs up emoji
In his speech on Wednesday, he revealed another new tool in the piss-taking prevention toolbox. If the government deems that councils have been negatively impacting 'economic growth, development capacity, or employment', it will be allowed to override their district plans. It's an extreme measure, and one Bishop said would only be in place until larger Resource Management Act reforms are passed. But if councils are offended, they could stand to look out the window at the vast apparatus they built for extracting, processing and distributing the piss across town centres and suburbs. Now they've been ordered to tear down that industrial-scale operation they've spent years constructing, perhaps we can finally build some houses instead.
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