Noting the poor conditions in New Zealand’s rental sector, the New Zealand Herald columnist Deborah Hill Cone recently asked: Why are renters not rising up? Why is there not a more vocal and activist tenants’ lobby group? Actually, renters are rising up. There are tenants groups pushing for change. For example, Wellington Renters United have put out a…More
A better tax system for better renting
There are a number of things that come up when people discuss how to improve the experience of renting in New Zealand. We usually talk about what changes we can make to our residential tenancies laws and norms, to provide for longer, more secure tenancies, better quality housing, and housing which is more affordable. Such…More
“Housing is just one part of making a good society” – An interview with Lisa McKenzie
Dr Lisa Mckenzie is a research fellow in Sociology at the London School of Economics. In February, I interviewed Lisa about her new book, Getting By: Estates, Class and Culture in Austerity Britain (Policy Press, 2015). The book is based on her ethnographic research into life in St Ann’s, a council housing estate of 15,000…More
Working for better rental housing in New Zealand
This is a repost of a piece written for the magazine of the International Union of Tenants – a brief introduction to some of the problems of renting in New Zealand. For the third of New Zealand households that rent, it can be difficult to find a warm, dry, secure and affordable rental home. Housing…More
“Patronizing pieces of politics” – An interview with Paul Cheshire
Paul Cheshire, an economist, is Emeritus Professor of Economic Geography at the London School of Economics. Alongside his academic work, he advises governments and international organisations; recently, he advised New Zealand’s Productivity Commission on its inquiry into using land for housing. I interviewed Professor Cheshire about his latest book, co-authored with Henry Overman and Max…More
Will this Bill improve our rental housing?
The government wants to make some changes to New Zealand’s Residential Tenancies Act (RTA), the law that governs the relationship between tenant and landlord. Under the draft Bill, landlords will be required to insulate their homes and install smoke alarms. That’s good, right? Yes and no. Smoke alarms and insulation are a good thing. But…More
“Building is not a panacea” – An interview with Danny Dorling
This is an interview with Danny Dorling, Professor of Geography at the University of Oxford, about his book, All that is Solid: How the Great Housing Disaster Defines Our Times and What We Can Do About It. The book describes problems – including homelessness, indebtedness, poor quality housing, high housing costs, housing insecurity, and evictions…More
Researchers help make some homes less damp
It’s awful to live in a damp home. We know it from experience, or from stories, like the one told by Kayla at the Wellington Renters United launch: of multi-coloured mould, of asthma, of a damp bed, of the loss of home as a sanctuary, of a dehumidifier covered in mould, of “a spacer prescribed…More
“Rich folk know how to not pay taxes”: An interview with Shamubeel Eaqub (Part 2)
This is the second part of a two-part interview with Shamubeel Eaqub, author, along with Selena Eaqub, of the book Generation Rent: Rethinking New Zealand’s Priorities. The interview took place on 9 November. In the first post, I asked Shamubeel about security, quality and cost in the private rental sector. In today’s post, he discusses…More
“We need to focus on the wins we can sustain”: An interview with Shamubeel Eaqub (Part 1)
Generation Rent: Rethinking New Zealand’s Priorities, by Shamubeel Eaqub and Selena Eaqub, has received a great deal of attention since it was released six months ago, and quite rightly. It’s an accessible, wide-ranging and thought-provoking read in which the authors discuss housing unaffordability, its importance, its causes, and its solutions. These range from the “palliative” –…More
