Explanatory note

This Supplementary Order Paper amends the Social Housing Reform (Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters Amendment) Bill (as proposed to be amended by Supplementary Order Paper 390), to limit the application of the provision that allows reviewable tenancies.

Reviewable tenancies will have the effect of extending insecurity of tenure to all State-house tenants, including the elderly. This will create needless stress, anxiety, and suffering for older New Zealanders, who least deserve such treatment, and are least able to cope with it.

Originally, Government policy was to impose reviewable tenancies only on new tenants, not on pre-existing tenants. Government Ministers have stated that this policy would not apply to the old or disabled. This Bill explicitly extends reviewable tenancies to all tenants of State and community housing and this amendment to clause 19 of the Bill seeks to ensure that new section 118 of the Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters Act 1992 will not apply to tenants who are old or disabled, or those with school-age children, who are likely to be worst affected by the provision.