Govt wants to be able to confiscate you house off you so it can build state houses

Stuff reports:

Homeowners could be required to hand their houses over to be redeveloped under a new bill working its way through Parliament.

The Urban Development Bill gives Kāinga Ora Homes and Communities new development and land acquisition powers.

Kāinga Ora Homes and Communities is a crown entity that combines Housing New Zealand, its development subsidiary HLC and the KiwiBuild unit. …

Bill McKay, a senior lecturer in architecture and planning at the University of Auckland, said the bill would give urban development authorities the same powers to seize property as the New Zealand Transport Authority (NZTA) already had.

“If NZTA decides it wants to build a motorway it can just acquire land… there might be negotiations around money but they’re going to get the land.”

The power for the state to take your house away from you is a massive one. I accept there is a need for such powers for things such as motorways as a motorway has to be able to connect up. You can’t really have a route with a house in the middle of it.

But housing developments are different. Giving the state the power to force you to sell your house simply because they want to build a different type of house there is a huge expansion of that power.