The Government is encouraging greater discretion when officials assess emergency housing applications, as the number being declined rises, and advocates warn that it is becoming harder for young people to access shelter.
As the Herald revealed this week, the number of applications for emergency housing has plummeted nationally since the Government tightened restrictions in August last year.
Despite that, the number being declined continues to rise, with more applications being declined than granted in Auckland.
There have been concerns from those who work alongside young people that it’s becoming significantly harder to access emergency housing, contributing to homelessness.
Housing Minister Chris Bishop said on Friday that it’s “clear that rough sleeping is a genuine problem”. He said it’s “rooted in our broken housing system and becomes more severe during challenging economic times”.
Five actions have been unveiled “aimed at supporting rough sleepers into stable housing”. Among them is encouraging the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) staff to use greater discretion when assessing emergency housing applications.
But Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka doesn’t want people thinking the Government is changing the requirements people need to meet to qualify for emergency housing.
“Those requirements are firm but fair, and to relax them risks going back to the emergency housing motel catastrophe under the previous Government, when thousands of families and children were consigned to live in dank motel rooms for months or even years on end,” he said.
“But MSD staff can and do use their discretion when assessing emergency housing applications. Together with Social Development Minister Louise Upston, we are making it clearer to those staff that they should feel empowered to use their good judgment and common sense when determining whether someone should qualify.”
The ministers said the Government was also expanding the Housing First programme, “which supports people experiencing chronic homelessness into permanent housing and provides tailored support.”
Bishop said: “Housing First delivers results – but there are still a lot of people identified within the Housing First programme in need of stable housing.
“So today we can announce that the Government will fund an additional 300 social homes for Housing First, effective immediately. The focus for these additional social homes will be rough sleepers.“
These additional social homes, likely to be mostly one-bedroom homes, he said, would be leased from the private rental market in Auckland, Hamilton, Wellington and Christchurch rather than built new.
“Leasing existing homes is a deliberate choice – it means Housing First providers can immediately begin contracting the homes and supporting people into them without the time lag caused by consenting and building.”
Potaka said $10 million would be given to support services helping people sleeping rough. This would help already established services with proven success.
“The third action, which is already under way, is work to increase the efficiency of transitional housing.“
This meant making sure the right transitional housing properties were supplied in the right locations, he said, “with the right providers to ensure we can better support demand”.
“There could be some rebalancing of places towards providers who have demonstrated an ability and willingness to work with rough sleepers.“
He said ministers had directed officials to significantly increase this occupancy rate by ensuring transitional housing places are in the areas with the greatest demand, reducing turnaround time between tenants, and speeding up the time it takes to move a new client into transitional housing.
“This will mean fewer units sitting vacant and more homeless people being housed.“
The fourth action announced was the expectation that MSD assess all beneficiaries going into these social homes for good cause to redirect their benefit to contribute to accommodation costs.
Potaka said most people in social housing “pay a contribution of 25% of their income”.
“Beneficiaries in social housing can choose to pay this through a direct deduction from their benefit – but many choose not to. Non-payment of rent over a sustained period can eventually result in tenancy termination and homelessness. Implementing a redirection where good cause exists was a recommendation from a frontline homelessness provider.”
The latest data, from Census 2023, showed almost 5000 people were living without shelter in New Zealand.
A Ministry of Housing and Urban Development report released in July combined this data with other statistics to show the homeless population was increasing faster than the national population.
Potaka said at the time that the Government was seeking advice from officials on further interventions to help rough sleepers.
“We are also open to new ideas that will make an enduring difference,” he said.
Officials defined homelessness as living situations where people had no way of accessing safe and secure housing. This could include having no shelter at all, living in temporary or uninhabitable accommodation, or staying in a house with others, such as couch surfing.
The report estimated that people living without shelter were more likely to be older, with over a quarter aged 65 or older, but 12% were under 15 years old.
Concerns from groups, collated in the report, included people and families sleeping rough, in cars, garages, or uninhabitable conditions, or couch surfing during the winter.
They told researchers there were increasing levels of hopelessness and complex needs because of methamphetamine use, anti-social behaviour and severe mental health concerns.
The Salvation Army’s second six-monthly survey of housing support providers, along with other homelessness-related data, revealed several trends, including increasingly restricted access to emergency housing.
The survey revealed a 386% rise since August 2024 in MSD rejections, citing that people had “contributed to their own homelessness”.
This project was a collaborative initiative involving the Salvation Army, Community Housing Aotearoa, Housing First Auckland Backbone, Kāhui Tū Kaha, Christchurch Methodist Mission, DCM and Wellington City Mission.
The group acknowledged the Government’s work to date on housing and its increased engagement with the issue after the release of the Housing and Urban Development ‘Homelessness Insights Report’.
Raphael Franks is an Auckland-based reporter who covers business, breaking news and local stories from Tāmaki Makaurau. He joined the Herald as a Te Rito cadet in 2022.
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