Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Small Business) Share this | Hansard source

Can I say, we do understand Australians are doing it tough, whether they be Australians trying to purchase a home, Australians with a mortgage or Australians who are renting. We do know, which is why, since we have come to office, we've announced and are implementing $32 billion in new housing initiatives. These are right across the board. They're helping more Australians into homeownership and helping renters. We're building more social and affordable homes and more transitional and emergency accommodation for women and children fleeing family violence, and we're providing additional support in terms of the Commonwealth rent assistance increases.

Right across the board, we need to build more homes for Australians. Australia doesn't have enough homes, but we haven't had enough homes for a long time now. We haven't been building enough homes, and the answer to Australia's housing challenges is supply. That is why we are focused on working with other tiers of government, with the community housing sector and indeed with the construction industry to get more homes on the ground as quickly as we can. Between the Commonwealth, states and territories, we are investing record amounts and getting as many homes built as quickly as we can, bearing in mind, of course, the capacity constraints in the sector. Understanding those constraints, we're looking at alternative methods of construction for homes, including modular homes and new technologies. We are training more tradies to make sure we can build the homes that Australia requires. We are looking at existing people in Australia on visas who have the skills and prioritising them in terms of skills recognition to get them into building more homes faster.

We are looking right across the board at the solutions and working with other tiers of government. We had the historic National Cabinet agreement last August, and that agreement will change the red tape around homes in Australia. That will make a massive difference when you look at the planning and zoning reforms that the states agreed they would do and when you look at the renters' rights the states agreed to lift so that we have more consistency and improved renters' rights in this country. The Grattan Institute modelled it and said our plans would save renters $32 billion in rent. We are wary of the fact that renters are doing it tough, but this housing challenge that we have at the moment is not going to be solved overnight; it will be solved carefully and methodically. There is not a silver bullet like some opposite seem to think there is. There absolutely is not. If there was, we absolutely would have used it.

But we are working very carefully to get as many homes on the ground as quickly as we can. We have an ambitious national housing target of 1.2 million homes across the country starting on 1 July and going up to the end of the decade. We are really serious about getting more homes on the ground. Just last week I joined the member for Boothby to announce more than 360 new and improved homes across South Australia through the Social Housing Accelerator. We provided $2 billion to the states last year. In the same week—just last week—we announced more than 100 new social and affordable homes in Melbourne, also from the Social Housing Accelerator. Last month we announced 700 new social and affordable homes, right across the country in New South Wales, Tasmania and Victoria. That's just in the last few weeks, that we have been on the ground getting tangible homes underway. We are meeting with tenants who are in homes that have been built because of decisions our government has made and that would not have been built otherwise.

Our recent budget includes an additional $6.2 billion in new investments, to build more homes, to slash some of the red tape and to get more housing on the ground. The budget specifically commits $1 billion to get homes built sooner, which will be direct funding for states and territories to get the roads and the infrastructure set up around some of the homes so that we can get more homes.

From 1 July, we have the new National Agreement on Social Housing and Homelessness; $9.3 billion for the states and territories. I was meeting with the ACT housing minister and the member for Canberra in the member's seat this morning. I was talking to the ACT minister about how important it is that they have this five-year agreement. The agreement includes the doubling of the Commonwealth homelessness funding of $400 million every year, which is matched by the states and territories. With our five-year agreement, we are also providing funding certainty to the states and territories.

On top of the agreement for the $9.3 billion, there is an additional $1 billion for Housing Australia that will go towards homes for young Australians and women and children fleeing family violence. This will be through Housing Australia. We have the Housing Australia Future Fund—the $10 billion fund. Our National Housing Accord means another 10,000 affordable homes will be going through Housing Australia. The fund only passed the parliament in October because it was delayed by the Greens teaming up with the Liberals to take an additional six months. If it wasn't for that, we would have homes on the ground today. But it was delayed by the Greens political party. It was passed in October. By November we had set up the fund and by January we'd gone out to tender. The tender closed just a few weeks ago and we'll be having announcements—getting first homes announced and under construction—later this year. We expect to have this up and running as soon as we can.

If it wasn't for the Greens political party these homes would be on the ground and under construction already. They need to accept responsibility for their role in delaying homes on the ground. They have been playing politics rather than getting tangible outcomes for people on the ground. When I meet with people in social and affordable homes and when I meet with renters, they are concerned about delays in getting homes on the ground. When I explain to them that the Liberal Party voted against new homes and that the Greens held up new homes, they are aghast. They are aghast that people would play games on what is a serious issue and, frankly, those opposite need to take responsibility for the decisions that they made.

We have more legislation in parliament around homeownership and those opposite have also been chipping in here. They claim to be the party of home ownership, but they're not supporting the shared-equity scheme, even though the LNP in Queensland supported the enabling legislation in the Queensland parliament just last month. The LNP in Queensland support it. The former Liberal Premier of New South Wales and the Tasmanian Liberal Premier both support shared-equity schemes to get Australians into homeownership sooner. But while the Greens political party say that shared equity is part of their policy, they apparently don't support this scheme either.

We're talking about 40,000 Australians that could be supported into homeownership through our shared-equity scheme. Apparently, that's not enough. But it is just one part; that is the point of the broad suite of policies under the Homes for Australia Plan. We have already made changes to the Home Guarantee Scheme, which has helped more than 110,000 Australians into homeownership since we came into office—110,000 Australians who are homeowners today, who wouldn't be if it weren't for the changes and the expansions that our government has made. We want to do more with Help to Buy and so when it's in the Senate—whether it be tomorrow or next week—those opposite, the Liberal Party and the Greens party, should be supporting it in the Senate. They should be telling their senators that the time has come and this legislation needs to be supported. It's important to support people right across the board, whether it be supporting people into new homes, supporting people into homeownership, building more homes for people to buy, building more affordable rentals, supporting more social and affordable homes or supporting transitional accommodation for women and children or older Australians. They should be supporting all the above because we need more of all the above. We need to build homes of every type right across the country.

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