The Social Housing Minister Paula Bennett said she got the calculations wrong about how much money was needed to build new social housing in Auckland.
Minister of Social Housing Paula Bennett has announced an extra $24 million in funding for social housing. Photo: RNZ /Cole Eastham-Farrelly
The government announced today that the social housing sector in Auckland would receive an extra $24.4 million from the government to boost supply.
It said the property market was extremely tight in the city and the money would allow community housing providers to build, or lease, more houses faster.
The funding is in addition to the $120m announced in May's Budget 2016 for new social housing places in Auckland.
Social Housing Minister Paula Bennett said Auckland needed more one- and two-bedroom and large social houses.
She told Checkpoint with John Campbell the money would be used to build 750 new places.
"We certainly identified that it needed a top-up to give more upfront funding as a grant, and so that's what we have done."
She said she had a comprehensive plan, from providing more emergency beds, to making more social houses available via Housing New Zealand and community housing providers.
"We had a formula, we certainly thought it was working, all of the modelling said it would, it hasn't quite worked so I've put more money in to make it work."
The money would be used for medium- to long-term projects, which would come onboard late 2017 through to 2018.
Mrs Bennett said she could not give an exact figure but there were hundreds more social houses in Auckland than there were five years ago.
