Kerre Woodham: Fairness and land acquisition for public works

Life isn't fair. It's one of the first lessons you learn. And it's not fair when you find yourself, or more accurately your home, right smack in the middle of a vital piece of infrastructure. There's been so many cases around the country over a long period of time, but more recently you had the buyout of houses after the Canterbury quakes. Technically the buyouts of more than 8,000 properties were structured as voluntary offers. However, many residents felt forced to accept because the Government explicitly stated that essential infrastructure and council services would cease in those zones. They would be no more. They'd be living in a literal no man's land. You had the buyout of 160 odd homes for the Waterview Tunnel. We've had 50 odd homes in Ranui in West Auckland bought by the council to make way for new floodplains and to uncover a buried piped stream. So if your house happened to be right over the top of that stream, you were gone. 

Now we have the buyout of homes in Grey Lynn in Auckland for the Northwest Busway project. Some of the residents in the suburb of Grey Lynn have lived in their homes for more than 50 years, but the bus needs to get through. The Northwest Busway project will give the growing population of West Auckland a valuable public transport option. When completed, it will be able to carry 9,000 passengers per hour either way. There's just the matter of the people living on the land that's needed for the expansion of the motorway. About 20 of the properties have already been purchased at a cost of $40 million, which seems about right for that part of Grey Lynn and should still buy you a house in this market in the area of similar quality and standard of renovation if that's where you want to live. Negotiations will take place over the coming years for the remainder of the busway project as it progresses. And it might be tough for the residents, but at least the Government's learned lessons from the past. 

Remember Raglan Golf Club? You might not, but the Crown originally seized the 63-acre coastal site for a Second World War wartime military airfield. Turns out it wasn't needed. But instead of giving the land back when the war was over, instead of returning it to its Tainui owners, the Government leased it to the Raglan County Council, who turned the land into a golf course. Local Māori were evicted and expansion plans for the golf course encroached upon Māori sacred sites and burial grounds. When Māori objected and started to protest on the golf course, the council said, “Oh, all right then, well we'll sell it back to you." And Māori said, the Tainui said, “I don't think so. You didn't pay for it in the first place. You took it off us because you said it was absolutely needed for the defence of the country, and then you didn't give it back."  

I mean, imagine if the Crown just said, “Right, well we need this for the busway, bugger off." You know, at least they've learned the error of their ways. Eventually the golf course was returned to Tainui, the rightful owners. So at least we're not living in those grim times. There seems to be an understanding that a home is more than land and a house. And the neighbourhood buyouts are always complicated by differences of opinion. We saw that in Canterbury, we saw that in Ranui, we're seeing it now in Grey Lynn. 

There are pragmatists, some are even sanguine about it, seeing it as a new opportunity. You know, it has to happen, it's got to happen, well, you know. Others want to chain themselves to trees – “over my dead body," they're saying, will the NZTA take their home. And in that same area roughly, a supermarket was buying up land for its brand new supermarket. One holdout who wanted something absurd for his run down little home. I mean it's his castle, but he was wanting an absurd amount, so they just built round him. All right then, stuff you, we'll build round you.  

But what options do you have if you have been there and done that? There'd be plenty of people who have had NZTA come knocking on their door, especially with the highways between Auckland and Cambridge, between Auckland and the Brynderwyns really, and there's still more looking to develop that. Residents of Canterbury, you know, what options do you have? Have you been treated fairly? I mean, just looking at the prices that they're paying for the Grey Lynn residents of that part of Grey Lynn, that's market rates, which is fair enough. You don't want, I suppose you do if you're the owner, but as the taxpayer, you don't want the former administration going in with an open chequebook saying, “No, name your figure. No, that's too low. Let's give you more." You would want to see market rates being paid, a fair market rate being paid, so if people want to stay in the area they can, if they want to move on elsewhere, they can do that too.