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July 20, 2025
Opinion: Blaming homelessness on the homeless
Claudette Hauiti
Posted On July 20, 2025
Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka reckons he’s delivered a housing win. He points to the drop in whānau living in emergency motels as proof the coalition government’s policy is working. But here’s the pātai: if fewer families are in motels, why are more of our people sleeping in cars, parks, and on the street?
On Q+A, on Sunday, Potaka was asked straight-up if tightening emergency housing eligibility had caused homelessness to rise. His answer? A sidestep. He cited mental health, addiction, and the cost of living as causes of homelessness. He’s deflecting – shifting blame onto those already struggling. It’s a tactic sociologists call the individualisation of structural issues: framing homelessness as personal failure, not policy failure. He’s blaming homelessness on the homeless, not on the systems that fail them.
Reports from MSD, Auckland Council, and HUD show rough sleeping has surged since August 2024 – the same month the government tightened eligibility rules for emergency housing. One of the new rules allows MSD to disqualify applicants if they’re deemed to have contributed to their own homelessness.
In Tāmaki Makaurau alone, there’s been a 53% increase in people living in cars and under tarpaulins.
Nationally, MSD and HUD report that over 112,000 people across Aotearoa are now severely housing deprived. Māori are hardest hit – 394 per 10,000, compared to 228 per 10,000 nationally. And although we make up just 16% of the population, we account for nearly a third of all homelessness in Aotearoa.
During COVID-19, demand for emergency accommodation skyrocketed. Motel stays became the Crown’s go-to response. In 2024, the coalition government cut emergency housing costs from a whopping $33 million a month to $3 million a month. That eye-watering $33 million monthly bill reflects not just policy failure, but systemic exploitation by some motel operators profiting off whānau in crisis. Instead of questioning why such spending was needed in the first place, the Crown turned its gaze, and its blame, toward those in need. Emergency housing was necessary, but the system was never built to last, or to serve Māori equitably.
Potaka claims 85% of those who exited emergency housing moved into better homes. But he also admits the government has no idea where the remaining 15% went. That’s thousands of whānau. Unaccounted for. Unhoused. Vanished.
Let’s be clear: that 15% isn’t just a number – that’s whakapapa. That’s our kaumātua, tamariki, our mokopuna. And when they fall through the cracks, it’s our marae, our kura, our wāhine who step up.
Meanwhile, Māori housing providers are doing the heavy lifting: He Korowai Trust, Ngāti Hine Health Trust, and Kāinga Pūmanawa are leading in the north. In Te Tairāwhiti, Toitū Tairāwhiti has secured $75 million to build 150 rentals – a partnership between Ngāti Porou, Rongowhakaata, Te Aitanga-a-Māhaki, and Ngāi Tāmanuhiri. These iwi-led solutions work, but they need resourcing.
In the 2025 May Budget, Māori housing funding was cut. The previous government committed over $730 million across Budgets 2021 and 2022. That’s now reduced to $200 million over four years, expected to build just 400 rentals. Good start, but nowhere near enough.
Tama Potaka is capable. He understands kaupapa Māori. But on this issue, he’s spinning numbers to hide the real story: more of our whānau are homeless now than a year ago. We don’t need more talking points. We need a strategy grounded in mana motuhake, whakapapa, and protection of our most vulnerable.
Because policy without protection? That’s not reform. That’s eviction by design.
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