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The Northland Housing Forum is calling the Government's plans to sell off state houses to he Maori and community housing sector reckless and doomed to fail.
Convenor Tim Howard says the Maori and community housing provider sector, particularly in the North, lacks the capacity to buy and administer a significant number of state houses.
He says rather than including financial support for providers or direct subsidies to help buy the houses. Prime Minister John Key just tells these groups to talk to the banks.
That ignores the tight balancing of budgets they already have to do to survive.
Mr Howard says rather than being about social housing, the policy seems to be about creating a window for a substantial sell-off of state houses to the private sector.
He says the proposal creates no new houses.
"The Maori and community housing sector already has plenty of obstacles to survive without extending to buying up state houses, for which it is not ready," he says.
"The sector would be forced into competition with their fellow providers and tender the lowest prices. Government bodies themselves are not even ready to administer this complex scheme."
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