Garth Hamilton (Groom, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I do like interjections. That's what fills me up with a bit of joy at the end of a long MPI. We have a commitment from the government of $500 million a year to build 6,000 houses. Forgive me, but the engineer in me does love to hear these sorts of numbers every now and then. The member for Deakin was right; that's about $83,000 a home. Let's get a view as to what the great Australian dream looks like under this housing fund, at $83,000 a home. At $4,000 a square metre, which is the going rate at the moment, that's a house four by five metres wide—just a little bit bigger than a single bay shed. That is the great Australian dream being pushed forward by this Labor government under this commitment. It is laughable. It is laughable and not defensible. It has no economic credibility whatsoever.

That is what you are selling to the Greens and to the people they're talking to—and you wonder why the Greens aren't with you on this one! Not even the Greens want to live in these tiny homes. Not even the Greens support this. What you have put on the table does not work—neither the mechanism nor the outcomes. They are laughable. That is why Australia is turning its back on this. That is why the Libs and the Nats are standing together. Under any scrutiny whatsoever, this falls apart like wet cake on a turntable. There is nothing to it that holds up.

We've heard it described over and again as a Ponzi scheme, and the criticism sticks. This does not work. The idea that you're going to borrow money and that the great economic brains trust that we see before us is going to work out how to invest that money and get a greater return than what it's paying is laughable. If someone emailed that to you like a Nigerian prince saying, 'I've got a great way to invest,' you would delete it and hopefully report it. That's the level of scam this is. This is not a credible solution, and it deserves scrutiny.

You opposite have all been arguing for it without thinking it through and without acknowledging that those are exactly the details you're putting in place. At best, if you are able to confirm $500 million a year, what you're providing for Australians is 30,000 homes that are four metres by five metres wide. What a fantastic solution you're putting on the table for those 25- to 29-year-olds. No wonder they are turning to the Greens! At least their idea is fanciful; yours is without any economic credibility. It deserves to be rejected outright, and I will continue to do so with every breath I have in this House, because that's our job—to hold you to account.

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