Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Brooke Stanley: Manaaki Rangatahi Spokesperson on Kainga Ora cracking down on rent debt

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Brooke Stanley: Manaaki Rangatahi Spokesperson on Kainga Ora cracking down on rent debt · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Right advocates are warning a tough approach on rent debt
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: from the country's biggest landlord will force more people onto
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: the streets. Coming or wants to crack down on tenants
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: with rent arears, some who owe tens of thousands of
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: dollars in months of unpaid rent. Brooks Stanley joins me
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  Speaker 1: now from Manaki Rangatahi, an advocacy group which aims to
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  Speaker 1: prevent and end youth homelessness. Thanks for being with us, Brooke,
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  Speaker 1: good morning.
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  Speaker 2: Good morning.
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  Speaker 1: What's your reaction to this.
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  Speaker 2: I think that the announcement made yesterday by the minister
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  Speaker 2: is going to increase and make come business worse, and
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  Speaker 2: we can't look at this announcement in isolation of the
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  Speaker 2: other announcements they've made. Instead of investing billions into prisons,
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  Speaker 2: they should be investing this money into preventative solutions like warm,
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  Speaker 2: affordable and universal housing and looking for cope oper multi solutions,
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  Speaker 2: because we know that those are solutions that are working
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  Speaker 2: on the ground.
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  Speaker 1: Brook Are you worried that this particular approach will affect
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  Speaker 1: younger tenants.
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  Speaker 2: We're worried that it will impact everybody who is in
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  Speaker 2: a KO house. We're worried about the pipeline from youth homelessness,
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  Speaker 2: because we know that that then as an indicator of
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  Speaker 2: homelessness itself. We're worried that there are no alternatives to
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  Speaker 2: emergency housing that the government is putting forward, and we're
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  Speaker 2: worried about the lack of strategy for addressing homelessness. There
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  Speaker 2: was a Homelessness Plan from twenty twenty until twenty twenty three,
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  Speaker 2: and at the moment there is nothing in place to
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  Speaker 2: carry on that MAHI or ensure that we work towards
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  Speaker 2: preventing and ending homelessness in ALTERI.
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  Speaker 1: Will so brookers people are evicted, where will they go?
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  Speaker 2: And that's what our christ is to give them the
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  Speaker 2: announcements while previous announcements made about emergency accommodation, we know
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  Speaker 2: that we're in amongst we're in the midst of a
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  Speaker 2: housing crisis, and there's no alternatives being put forward for
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  Speaker 2: emergency housing for addressing the immediate harm of that. But
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  Speaker 2: then also there's no long term strategy either. We know
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  Speaker 2: that people are ending up on the streets there and
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  Speaker 2: there's ending up in overcrowded housing, and we're already seeing
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  Speaker 2: an increase of homelessness with people going back to living
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  Speaker 2: in their cars.
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  Speaker 1: Brook, Why aren't tenants paying their rent?
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  Speaker 2: I think that's a good question, and I think we
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  Speaker 2: need to be looking at the wider context. We know
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  Speaker 2: that KO housing is provided to some of our most
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  Speaker 2: disadvantaged Puno that the reason why people are in KO
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  Speaker 2: housing is because it's affordable, but that people in their
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  Speaker 2: spaces are often experiencing poverty, They're experiencing high complex needs.
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  Speaker 2: There's a lot of intergenerational issues, and so we need
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  Speaker 2: to look to be addressing those long term and looking
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  Speaker 2: to short term solutions to ensure that that harm is addressed,
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  Speaker 2: those issues are addressed first, but also looking to longer
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  Speaker 2: term solutions to ensure that you know that we are
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  Speaker 2: ensuring the right to housing, that everybody has a warm,
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  Speaker 2: safe and affordable home and alter.
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  Speaker 1: It or so, how do we resolve this because the
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  Speaker 1: government can't keep sort of paying off tens of thousands
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  Speaker 1: of dollars in people's rent.
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  Speaker 2: I think that the government is there to serve the
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  Speaker 2: communities and that they shouldn't be looking to run using
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  Speaker 2: them as a business. And I think if we look
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  Speaker 2: at centering the needs of people in the space and
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  Speaker 2: actually people in our communities, then the solutions will the
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  Speaker 2: solutions are there. We can ensurying the right to housing.
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  Speaker 2: We can have a strategy to ensure that there is
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  Speaker 2: no homelessness altered, or we can implement a duty to
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  Speaker 2: assist to ensure that no government department can turn people
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  Speaker 2: away if they're experiencing homelessness. The government has all the
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  Speaker 2: power and the resources to do that. We saw them
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  Speaker 2: enact that power during COVID with the previous government, and
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  Speaker 2: we're wondering where their energy is from this government and
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  Speaker 2: confronting the issue of homelessness and even poverty and alter
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  Speaker 2: These are huge crises that are happening, and we've seen
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  Speaker 2: a massive increase in homelessness and even poverty with this government,
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  Speaker 2: and the harm that causes in our communities. Is this disturbing?
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  Speaker 2: It's horrendous, especially given the you know, we've just had
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  Speaker 2: them apologize for the report that's come out for people
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  Speaker 2: that have been abused in state of faith based care
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  Speaker 2: and so you know, if we have that apology and
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  Speaker 2: no actions to ensure that those things don't happen again,
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  Speaker 2: and some of our Finno who have experienced have been
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  Speaker 2: in state care in KO housing, Yeah, it's empty. Those
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  Speaker 2: apologies are empty.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, look, Broke, appreciate your thoughts on this this morning.
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  Speaker 1: That was Broke Stanley. There from Monarchi finger Taki for
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