Zoe McKenzie (Flinders, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Now the modern Labor Party punishes those who earn over $130,000, even though you need to earn $100,000 more than that to be able to buy a house in my electorate. They plan to punish those who want to buy a ute—the most popular cars in my electorate being the HiLux, Ranger and RAV4. They want to punish our industries. They even, I read in the paper this morning, want to punish recyclers with a new recycling tax—the first in the world, apparently—that charges those who want to recycle for sending waste overseas to be processed because it can't be processed here.

This Help to Buy scheme, like so many others, promises a myth, a hope, a dream in which the fine detail actually destroys and which, like so many other Labor white elephants we have seen legislated in this place, will miss its target and fail to fulfill the dreams of young and old would-be homeowners alike. This bill and the associated bills will drive up the cost of cheaper homes—that is, if you can find a house under $950,000 in Sydney or $650,000 in Brisbane. The competition at that level will be that much fiercer because the lucky few who will fit into the odd angles of this scheme and its rules will believe that they have a 30 to 40 per cent head start on all the others who do not.

It will also in time drive chaos in the real estate market. What happens when you sell the property? Does the government get the 30 or 40 per cent from the time the property was bought, or does it get the appreciated or even depreciated value? What happens if you've lived in the house for a while, things got really tough, you had to rent it out to make ends meet or to accommodate a growing family, or you move back in with mum and dad for a while or rent something larger on the outskirts of town? Does the government chip in on the capital gains tax when it's charged at the end? I doubt it. As with so much ALP policy in this place, it's too little too late. Its promise will in no way match up with the reality that it delivers.

We know that cost-of-living pressures are crushing Australian families and workers whilst the government is busy patting itself on the back for a 0.1 per cent real wage increase, even though those in small to medium businesses, which are the backbone of this country's economy, are seeing next to nothing of that. We have higher inflation than any major advanced economy, making it virtually impossible to get into the real estate market.

We've also seen food prices go up by nine per cent, electricity prices go up by 20 per cent and gas prices go up by 27 per cent. There have been 12 interest rate hikes, with the highest interest rates and rent rises in over a decade. Today, the average mortgage costs some $25,000 more than it did under the coalition. For most local families, rising costs and interest rates will dwarf anything that they might get from the government's tax cuts in July. While they're struggling to make ends meet, they will find that schemes like these will offer them nothing.

We do know how to address home affordability in this country, and the answer is supply. Rather than dress up harebrained and ineffectual schemes which give the government the back bedroom in your home, this government should be on the phone to the states and territories incentivising the release of land. It should be working with the building and construction industry rather than smashing them with draconian and out-of-date IR laws that will swamp them in red tape, lock them up for inadvertent missteps and give unions free rein over their worksites.

Above all, this government needs to stop making promises it cannot keep. This week, the Housing Industry Association confirmed that Labor's plan to build new homes will fall at least 200,000 homes short of its promise of 1.2 million new homes. At the same time, rents have increased by some 26 per cent, new home approvals remain at their lowest levels in a decade and lending for new homes is at a 20-year low. All the while, Labor plans to bring 1.6 million people to our shores in the next five years. I certainly hope that, when the good dwellers of Dunkley head to the polling booths on Saturday, they remember that you can't trust the Australian Labor Party with your home.

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