Changes to the Resource Management Act making it easier to build houses in the country's biggest cities has passed its final reading in Parliament with cross-party support.
Photo: RNZ / Angus Dreaver
Labour and National worked together on the legislation.
The only party who voted against the bill was ACT, arguing it will do nothing to solve the housing crisis.
From August next year Auckland Council, along with city councils in Hamilton, Tauranga, Wellington, and Christchurch, will have to allow up to three houses, up to three storeys on the vast majority of sections - without a resource consent.
Minister for the Environment David Parker said it would enable homes to be built sooner, in places people want to live.
"We've heard for many years now that too many kiwis are locked out of the housing market, they will see this bill as a further opportunity to get a foot on the housing ladder and obtain a healthy and secure home to own or rent," he said.
Modelling by PwC predicted the new rules will deliver about 48,000 to 105,000 new homes in the next five to eight years.
National and Labour announced the bill together in October in a rare show of unity.
However, not everyone is happy about the speed taken to get the bill over the line before the end of the year.
Scrutiny at the select committee stage took weeks rather than months, but National's deputy-leader Nicola Willis said that feedback has been taken on board.
"We have made changes to allow for landscaped areas, to allow for greater outdoor living and outlook spaces and to reduce the height of housing in relation to boundaries," she said.
Nicola Willis said changes had also been made to make sure local authorities could use discretion to exclude areas that are unsuitable.
"Areas for example that were subject to natural hazards, areas that have particular historic heritage, areas which would not be able support the level of housing that this bill implies."
But ACT's housing spokesperson Brooke van Velden was not only unhappy with the speed of the legislation - she was also questioning the National-Labour accord .
"That's why they stood up to have a bipartisan approach, because they wanted to abandon attacking eachother on an issue they have no credibility on," she said.
Van Velden said the bill did nothing to solve the problem of infrastructure.
"The ACT party does want to build more homes, but we don't want more sewage in the streets," she said.
However, Parker dismissed ACT's criticism, saying a supposedly libertarian party should not oppose deregulation.
