Andrew Wilkie (Clark, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

Australia's housing system is broken, as evidenced by the fact that our 30-year housing affordability decline has been among the worst in the developed world. Moreover, according to the 2016 census, homelessness has increased 13.7 per cent in five years, and housing prices across Australia continue to rise, with a jump of 2.1 per cent in February this year, the largest national monthly rise since August 2003.

In my home state of Tasmania, the median house price for first home buyer purchases hit a record high of $355,000 in 2020, compared to $335,000 in 2019 and $268,000 in 2015. Reports suggest this could be attributed to a serious undersupply of residential housing in Tasmania. Furthermore, Tasmania is now the most expensive place to rent compared to anywhere else in Australia, with rents rising 36 per cent in the past five years. No wonder the Real Estate Institute of Australia estimates the proportion of income required to meet rent payments in Hobart is now a staggering 29.5 per cent, 5.5 per cent higher than the national level.

The consequences of this are very human, with over 8,000 households in the private rental market now in housing stress in Tasmania. For example, today an article in the Mercury newspaper reported that one woman was told by her real estate agent that her rent was rising from $220 a week to $350 week, a 59 per cent increase. Moreover, there are 3,373 Tasmanians on the waitlist for social housing, with priority applicants waiting an average of 64 weeks to be placed. Tasmanian people aged 16 to 24 account for one-third of this waitlist and, according to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, one in four Tasmanians accessing specialist homelessness services in 2020 were young people. In fact, on any given day, 499 young Tasmanians aged 16 to 24 are seeking housing services support.

My office has been inundated with people who have been sleeping in cars and on friends' couches for over 12 months. Many of these people are mothers with young children who have either been turned away from crisis accommodation, which is also at capacity, or been unable to go to crisis accommodation because it's simply unsuitable. Obviously, these people simply cannot afford private rental and have nowhere to go while they wait for public housing.

Furthermore, the National Rental Affordability Scheme, a federal initiative which offers subsidised rent at 80 per cent or less of the market value rent, has started to expire in Tasmania, leaving people unable to afford private rentals. Again, the consequences of this are very human. One person in my community, a disability pensioner, is facing life in a caravan park after losing financial support to pay the rent on his home via the NRAS.

Then there is the impact of short stay accommodation, such as Airbnb, and the effect it's having on the rental market in Hobart. A report released by the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute shows that, worryingly, Hobart has the highest short-stay density in the country and one of the highest Airbnb densities in the world. Obviously, the lack of regulation in this area in Tasmania has led to more people converting their properties to short-term accommodation rather than making them available as long-term rentals, something that is urgently needed in Hobart. In fact, I understand that about 10 per cent of residential property in Hobart is now short-stay accommodation.

Significantly, the economic downturn resulting from COVID-19 has also placed many in the rental market at risk. Furthermore, the fact that JobKeeper and the JobSeeker supplements are finishing at the end of this month is going to cause a whole new level of trouble. A study by ANU suggests that winding back these payments will push an extra 740,000 Australians across the country into poverty. These people will be forced to choose between paying their rent and bills and feeding their family. This is clearly unacceptable in a country as rich as Australia. This research that we're seeing coming out is entirely consistent with recent research from Finder which shows that almost half of Australia's workers would run out of money in under a month if they lost their jobs and one in five people have less than $250 in their savings accounts.

Clearly, federal and state governments—and, when it comes to short-stay accommodation, also local governments—have to do something about this housing crisis, which is across the whole country, not just in Tasmania. We need dramatic policy change at all levels of government, and we need more crisis accommodation. In Tasmania, we need more Housing Tasmania properties and other social housing. We need more supported accommodation for people with special needs. We need tax reform, including watering down negative gearing and capital gains tax concessions. We need to introduce rent-to-buy public housing in jurisdictions where it doesn't exist. We need a 30 per cent increase, at least, in Commonwealth rent assistance. We need permanent and improved grants and access to low-interest loans for first-home buyers. And, in my own city of Hobart, we need better public transport, such as light rail, to better link areas of new housing growth with jobs and with hospitals and other services.

We must also return Airbnb and other short-stay accommodation to the original model, which was where locals could make a bit of extra money from their spare room or granny flat or having an airbed on their lounge room floor. That way, tourists could enjoy an authentic local experience, without permanent residents—in my home state, Tasmanians—being squeezed out of their own communities.

What I am talking about will obviously cost money. It will cost a lot of money, but we're a rich country and we can afford to ensure that there is a roof over everyone's head. It's as simple as that. The GDP in Australia, just before coronavirus, was almost $2 trillion. I'll say that again. Australia's GDP just before COVID was worth almost $2 trillion a year. We're estimated to have the world's 14th biggest GDP and the 11th highest GDP per capita. Before COVID, we had had 28 consecutive years of growth, and we are one of the few economies in the post World War II period to achieve this.

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