The Star: August 11, 2016

The Star follow us on facebook.com/riseupchristchurch
Thursday August 11 2016 17
Your land. Your people. Your stories.
Bought to you by
Every Wednesday at 7.30pm on CTV Freeview Channel 40
live and on demand at ctv.co.nz
The proposed city plan also
allows for taller commercial
buildings in commercial areas
such as Riccarton which increases
the number of workers and thus
will exasperate the traffic and
hence parking problems.
The university also contributes
to parking problems in surrounding
streets. The restricted parking,
P120 or P60, does have positive
benefits. It prevents the all day
high density parking with vehicles
parked on or even over driveways
making it difficult and dangerous
for residents to exit their
properties. In my area it allows
for visitors to local residences, as
well as providing parking for those
wanting to nip into a business or
for lunch and for Riccarton Bush
activities.
The issue here is that there are
those who persistently abuse the
time limit and park all day. The
city council does not have
enough staff to patrol all such areas
and the odd fine is still cheap
parking.
Perhaps a three strikes and
then increased fine might assist.
However, in the end, alternatives
to alleviate stress on parking need
to be found.
Registering tradespeople vehicles
with the city council for all day
parking certainly worked well
when we had repairs being
carried out on our house. I would
certainly support the call for
resident parking permits across
the city.
into their first home
Reader Nicola Wilkie
responds to an article
about a smoking ban set
to be brought back at
Hillmorton Hospital
The smoking ban has failed
before, in 2010, put forward by
the Christchurch District Health
Board.
Those under the Mental
Health Act (1993) I see primarily
will be targeted – a loss of mana
and dignity on these groups of
people in our society.
A reverse effect may well happen
if the ban goes ahead, where
patients may be deterred from
seeking out services.
The rigid root cause as to why
patients end up in a mental
health facility I doubt would
have little to do with ‘smoking’.
Tobacco is not illegal – nor
is the freedom of choice. Ultimately,
it is the patient’s right to
The new caps for Christchurch
are $500,000 for existing homes,
and $550,000 for new-builds.
Through KiwiSaver HomeStart
we expect to assist 90,000 New
Zealanders into their first home
over five years.
These increases will also be
applied to the Welcome Home
loans – the loans which enable
first home buyers to buy with a
10 per cent deposit and, because
they are Crown-guaranteed, they
are exempt from the loan-tovalue
ratio limits administered
by the Reserve Bank.
These latest steps are part
of National’s wider package
of measures to address the
challenge of housing supply
and affordability in our strong,
growing economy.
The package includes
creating special housing areas
in high-demand areas to fasttrack
the building of homes;
a $1 billion Housing
Infrastructure Fund to
accelerate new housing in
smoke – as it is for other members
of society.
Obesity and food-related
illnesses have a higher death
rate by over double than that of
smokers – so is the CDHB going
to ban lollies and fizzy drink
from the patients?
Mental health patients are
still given the right to vote unlike
those who are incarcerated
in a prison where smoking is
banned.
the high-demand areas
where it’s needed most;
establishing independent Urban
Development Authorities to
accelerate housing development
in high-demand areas; and
reforming the Resource
Management Act to make
it easier for councils and
developers to get houses
consented and built.
Gerry Brownlee is
Minister supporting Greater
Christchurch Regeneration
Aim to make
housing affordable
OVER THE last four weeks,
while Parliament was in recess
Andrew Little spent time on the
ground in Christchurch seeing
first-hand what housing needs
in Christchurch and Canterbury
look like.
Andrew knows full well that
our current housing crisis is not
confined to Auckland.
The Labour team and Andrew
have toured the city and visited
some exciting organisations and
people hell-bent on actually getting
homes built.
We visited with Habitat for
Humanity and met with people
who lives have been changed by
having the chance to get into
their own home. We heard firsthand
about the improved health
benefits for the children in this
family of a warm and dry home.
We’ve visited large new
housing developments such as
Wigram Skies and well-done
developments, that offer a range
of price points and are designed
to foster communities in their
new neighbourhoods.
Where we all differ from the
current Government is that we
understand that the current
development models won’t provide
the impetus needed to get it
cracking. A Labour government
will.
We’ve also seen the technology
that will allow Labour to
achieve its Kiwibuild vision of
building houses at the scale, pace
and affordability required. The
Concision Factory in Rolleston
is a joint venture between Span
Build and Mike Greer Homes
that specialises in offsite manufacturing
of houses. These are
prefabricated homes that are
built and assembled in a factory,
then shipped to the site. Each
house is different but the process
greatly speeds up the time it
takes to build a home.
With a major Governmentbacked
programme like Labour’s
Kiwibuild plan, techniques like
this will let us drastically reduce
the cost of building homes.
Recent statistics show that
since 2010, house prices in
Canterbury have jumped 36 per
cent. That’s pushing home ownership
out of the reach of many
families.
This is a problem that seems
to have completely escaped the
current government – they were
recently defending the $900,000
price tag of apartments in the
East Frame Development as “affordable.”
Clearly, their definition
is a little bit different to the
average Cantabrians.
So it’s clear that if we’re going
to get affordable homes for families
in Canterbury, we can’t settle
for a business as usual approach.
We need fresh thinking and new
ideas. Luckily, Cantabrians have
that in spades.
Megan Woods is Labour’s
Canterbury spokeswoman