Jim Chalmers (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

and that applies to people struggling to find a roof over their head as well. This is a longstanding challenge, but we are taking decisive action across a range of areas. We have had a wasted decade when it comes to investment in housing, and we are doing our best to turn that around and to clean up the mess that we inherited. We are working to get more homes, more supply, making it easier to own a home, and also taking some of the sting out of these higher rents, with the biggest increase in Commonwealth rent assistance in three decades. We know, of course, there is more work to be done, but this is a government which is working for Australia, delivering billions of dollars as investment in housing, building more homes and more supply and helping to ease the pressure on renters. That's why, despite all of that effort, it beggars belief that, in the Senate today, those opposite voted for fewer homes and more homelessness and higher rents. We are cleaning up the mess they left behind.

Opposition members interjecting—

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