Photo: Claudine van Massenhove
Students living in Auckland University halls are being encouraged to stop paying rent from next month to protest what are being called "unjustifiable" price increases.
Students living in the halls of residences nation-wide are facing rising costs. The weekly cost to live in a single standard room at the University of Auckland's Waipārūrū Hall, the country's biggest student residence, jumped from $470 last year to $540 this year.
Students for Fair Rent was planning a rent strike for students, which would be launched on Friday afternoon. The strike would involve Auckland University students not paying any accommodation fees from 1 May.
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The group's chair Matthew Lee said they did not know how many students would sign on.
But fees should be in-line with rents paid for private accommodation in the city, he said.
"Two years ago I was living at Waipārūrū Hall, I was paying $435 (a week), now it's at $510 to $540 so it's a massive increase, it's been an 8 percent increase year on year for the past few years.
"These are students that are paying, we're full time students, we should be studying full time, we shouldn't be expected to work 10, 20, even 30 hours just to pay rent."
Lee told Nine to Noon discussions with the University of Auckland hadn't gone as constructively as they had hoped.
He said the University was within its rights to evict students who did not pay.
"I think the University has a responsibility to provide safe, secure and affordable accommodations to its students, unfortunately it doesn't."
Green Party co-leader and Auckland Central MP Chloe Swarbrick said "somethings got to give" regarding university accommodation.
"Student accommodation is excluded from all of the other regulations that we impose on regular rental situations."
Students did not have access to the Tenancy Tribunal or legislative rent controls, she told Nine to Noon.
Swarbrick said she had raised the matter with Minister Chris Bishop.
In a statement, the University of Auckland said the fee students paid to live in the halls included furniture, power, water, wifi, heating, and access to the recreation centre.
"With the massive jump in CPI in 2022, and high inflationary pressures since, our costs have risen. Many of the costs associated with student accommodation have increased at a much higher rate than the CPI, for example, in 2023-24, food (12 percent) and wages (10 percent)."
Comparatively, fees were increasing this year an average of 8.2 percent for catered halls and 7.3 percent for self-catered halls, it said.
Regarding the university's planned response to the rent strike, it said only that students had the right to express their opinions "so long as they are respectful and peaceful".