{"id":492595,"date":"2026-06-24T02:59:18","date_gmt":"2026-06-24T02:59:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/492595\/"},"modified":"2026-06-24T02:59:18","modified_gmt":"2026-06-24T02:59:18","slug":"labour-proposes-billion-dollar-govt-underwrite-to-support-community-housing-providers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/492595\/","title":{"rendered":"Labour proposes billion-dollar Govt underwrite to support community housing providers"},"content":{"rendered":"\u201cEvery dollar saved on interest is a dollar that can go into building homes and supporting tenants,\u201d Labour\u2019s housing spokesman Kieran McAnulty said.<\/p>\n
Since 2019, the Community Housing Funding Agency and its manager, Community Finance, have facilitated more than $530 million in lending.<\/p>\n
McAnulty stressed that while Labour was committed to helping CHPs, it still wanted to see K\u0101inga Ora \u2013 Homes and Communities play a key role in building state houses. <\/p>\n
He wouldn\u2019t say whether Labour would scale K\u0101inga Ora up to the size it was when the party was last in Government. <\/p>\n
The current Government clipped K\u0101inga Ora\u2019s wings, putting more of the onus on CHPs to build state houses.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we\u2019re going to make a credible dent in the housing shortage in this country, and address the growing need for social housing, we can\u2019t be one or the other. We\u2019ve got to support both,\u201d McAnulty said. <\/p>\n
He said Labour would make further policy announcements on both K\u0101inga Ora and CHPs.<\/p>\n
He noted the Community Housing Funding Agency had been asking the Government to guarantee the bonds it issued, so it aligned with its counterparts in Australia and other parts of the world.<\/p>\n
But in October, the Government instead committed to guaranteeing 80% of eligible bank loans to CHPs. Treasury has some experience guaranteeing bank loans to businesses, including from the pandemic.<\/p>\n
Housing Minister Chris Bishop said the Government would keep its Community Housing Provider Loan Guarantee Scheme in place until June 2027, with loans written under the scheme remaining Government-backed for five years. <\/p>\n
McAnulty said he would look to extend Bishop\u2019s underwrite beyond June 2027 on Treasury\u2019s advice.<\/p>\n
As at March 31, $109m of bank lending had been approved under the scheme.<\/p>\n
None of the $900m the Government put aside to backstop the scheme had been drawn down on – yet, at least – as there hadn\u2019t been any loan defaults.<\/p>\n
Labour said it would put $950m aside for its Community Housing Funding Agency bond underwrite in Budget 2027.<\/p>\n
Community Housing Funding Agency chief executive James Palmer welcomed the policy, and assured that international experience suggested the Crown was highly unlikely to be left out of pocket. <\/p>\n
Indeed, the agency would have to use its capital if it couldn\u2019t meet its obligations to its investors, before it tapped into the Crown underwrite.<\/p>\n
Palmer believed Labour\u2019s proposed underwrite would help the agency continue growing, with scale delivering efficiencies for the sector. <\/p>\n
He also believed the guarantee would see the agency\u2019s A+ credit rating upgraded. <\/p>\n
Palmer didn\u2019t see the Government\u2019s bank loan underwrite as a threat to the agency, noting it had more than doubled the number of CHPs it lent to over the past year to 34. <\/p>\n
He recognised the need was huge. Several billions of dollars would be required to build new houses to accommodate the 19,704 applicants on the public housing waitlist.<\/p>\n
Jen\u00e9e Tibshraeny is the Herald\u2019s Wellington business editor, based in the Parliamentary press gallery. She specialises in Government and Reserve Bank policymaking, economics and banking.<\/p>\n
Stay ahead with the latest market moves, corporate updates, and economic insights by subscribing to our Business newsletter<\/a> \u2013 your essential weekly round-up of all the business news you need.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cEvery dollar saved on interest is a dollar that can go into building homes and supporting tenants,\u201d Labour\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":492596,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[46520,74185,3269,138,6434,52494,1259,86684,24912,2273,3339,6721,10527,5812,111,139,69,3587,2994,33349,1886,61,246826,3382],"class_list":["post-492595","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-balance","tag-billiondollar","tag-build","tag-business","tag-cheaper","tag-committing","tag-community","tag-crowns","tag-govt","tag-houses","tag-housing","tag-labour","tag-loans","tag-make","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-proposes","tag-providers","tag-sheet","tag-support","tag-to","tag-underwrite","tag-using"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/492595","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=492595"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/492595\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/492596"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=492595"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=492595"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=492595"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}