Swarbrick's new bill aims to 'weed out' Healthy Homes 'cowboys'

Green MP Chlöe Swarbrick's new member's bill is aimed at ensuring landlords comply with Healthy Homes standards, something she says is a "wild west".

Swarbrick told 1News Healthy Homes standards - which were brought in by the Government in 2019 - were in effect "largely voluntary" for landlords, and relied on tenants to raise issues through the Tenancy Tribunal.

She said the bill, the Residential Tenancies (Healthy Homes Certification Scheme) Amendment Bill, would compel all landlords to comply with the certification, and ensure certifiers' authorisation was regulated.

Landlords would also have to provide proof of certification at the beginning of every tenancy, and renew it every four years, at a cost of about $150 to $300.

Certification would also cover obligations under other laws and regulations, such as the Building Act, and smoke alarms and other fire and emergency legislation - something Swarbrick said was particularly important in the wake of the Loafer's Lodge fire in Wellington earlier this year.

Swarbrick said it "deals with a bit of the wild west" of the implementation and compliance of Healthy Homes standards.

Asked about the compulsion of landlords to comply with the standards, she said "that's kind of the point" of her member's bill - the rules were not currently particularly enforced.

Anyone could certify a property under the rules, she said - including the landlord.

"It just makes the system work more efficiently [and helps] weed out the cowboys."

“The Government currently has no real world data on how many private rental properties are Healthy Homes Standard compliant.

"They have no idea how many landlords have self-verified exclusions to those standards.

"They have no idea whether the companies holding themselves out as verifying these standards are doing rigorous checks. These systemic failures are precisely how renters fall through the cracks and end up in our hospitals with preventable illnesses from cold, damp homes."

She said her bill "fixes these issues once and for all".

The member's bill ballot - which is drawn from a biscuit tin in Parliament - allows all MPs a chance to introduce a bill, provided it is drawn from the ballot in a draw system.

Swarbrick said the Government could circumvent that by adopting "this obvious, evidence-based" bill as a Government bill.

Last year, Swarbrick's questioning of associate minister of housing Poto Williams revealed the Government could not answer how many rental properties had been assessed by third parties nor landlords themselves as meeting Healthy Homes standards.

It also revealed the Government did not collect data on whether rental properties were compliant with Healthy Homes standards, with Williams responding: "It is the landlord’s obligation to ensure they are meeting their obligations under the [law]. Tenancy Services routinely assesses landlords and property management companies for their compliance with tenancy laws".

Landlords who don’t meet their obligations under the Healthy Homes standards are in breach of the Residential Tenancies Act 1986 and may be liable for exemplary damages of up to $7,200.

All private rentals must comply with the law by mid-2025.

Former Housing Minister Nick Smith announced plans to develop and trial a housing warrant of fitness scheme for state homes in 2014, but did not extend it, fearing costs for landlords would be passed on to tenants.

A study released in 2015 by the Sapere Research Group used Building Research Association of New Zealand data to conclude the benefits of enforcing a warrant of fitness scheme outweighed the cost of compliance - about $653 million at the time. It also found the total benefits of reduced accidents and improved health would be about $987 billion.

The bill seems to have gone down well with advocates for renters, who say it will create a "proactive approach" for tenants living in unhealthy homes.

"It's certainly something we've been asking for for a long time," Renters United president Geordie Rogers told 1News.

"From speaking to renters, one of the hardest things among the cost of renting right now is the fact that they're paying an exorbitant amount for something that is not healthy and warm."

He acknowledged that not all landlords were "cowboys" but said the lack of regulation in the market is making it easy for those who don't follow the rules to slip through the cracks.

"There are lots of different landlords out there — from professional landlords with multiple properties to the hands-off landlords who just buy a property, put someone in it and then never talk to that person again."

Rogers believes the new proposal would hold them to account.

"Across that spectrum, every single one of those people needs to be held accountable for the quality of that home that they're renting out, and that's exactly something that a warrant of fitness does."

The policy is far less popular among landlords, who believe it would add extra bureaucracy to a system that is already heavily regulated.

"It's over egg," New Zealand Property Investors Federation vice president Peter Lewis said.

He said the legislation only applies to rentals, not addressing owner-occupied homes, Airbnbs, motels or retirement homes.

"I know my own home doesn't comply with the healthy homes regulation because we don't have a heat pump, we don't want a heat pump — we've got perfectly adequate heating.

"That is the silly part of it, I've known people who live quite happily in a house for 15-25 years, and yet if they've rented out that same house, it would suddenly become a dangerous health hazard.

"It should be every house that has to comply or not at all."

He believes it's not always clear whether housing-related health issues are from rentals or owner-occupied homes.

"When Phil Twyford got up on his hind legs and said there were all these people in hospital with breathing difficulties and so on.

"When you take a kid to the hospital, you aren't asked if you own or you rent, so it's entirely possible that all those kids do come from rentals, but then again, it is also possible that they came from owner-occupied housing."

He argued that New Zealand already has the adequate framework to hold landlords accountable through the Tenancy Tribunal, and further regulation would make things difficult.

"The tenant has the power to ensure that their landlord has the property to that legislated standard.

"That, to me, is the most efficient way of doing it rather than incurring the cost of having yet another great, highly paid bureaucracy driving around the country with forms of compliance."

Lewis said the extra costs to keep a house compliant would see rents go up.

"We've already got Ms Swarbrick moaning on that rents are too high, despite the fact that they've only gone up about half the rate of general inflation, and so that's going to put more costs onto the tenant."

Lewis is concerned that more regulation would drive housing underground, with tenants and landlords making informal agreements — leading to more unhealthy homes.

National's Housing spokesperson Chris Bishop told 1News the policy would likely lead to fewer rentals being put on the market — thus higher prices.

"That is not something we want to see," he said.

ACT's housing spokesperson Brooke van Velden said the Green's approach would "hurt the people they're trying to help".

"The problem with rental housing is not a lack of bureaucracy or that landlords want to rent out bad housing. It's in their interests to rent out good housing and get more money," she told 1News.

"The reason housing is poor is that it's too difficult to build and upgrade it under our current infrastructure funding and land use regulation regime."

She said that what the market needs is "comprehensive reform" of land use regulation, infrastructure funding, and building consent rules.

"Reforms that create an abundance of housing will create a tenants' market.

"More stringent regulations or more onerous enforcement onto current regulations will only lead to landlords exiting the market, leaving tenants even worse off."

- Additional reporting by Jack Horsnell