Stephen Bates (Brisbane, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We're in the midst of a shocking housing crisis. Residents in my electorate are in extreme distress. They struggle to pay their rent or their mortgages, and the situation is getting worse, with no hope of meaningful support in sight. I regularly hear from individuals, couples and families who tell me that they are about to be forced to live in their cars because they have nowhere else to go.

When a family is priced out of their own neighbourhood, they lose more than just their home. They're cut off from their community, as are their children, who are forced to move away from their schools and friendships. Even those who are managing to get by in the spiralling rental market—renters make up nearly 60 per cent of my electorate—are having their rents hiked and dreams of owning their own homes stolen from them.

The government's funding of 30,000 new affordable homes across the country over the next five years simply does not cut it. The community knows the government's housing plan does not go anywhere near far enough. In fact, when you crunch the numbers, their plan will create only three per cent of the dwellings needed for people experiencing housing stress.

We must build enough social housing so we can clear the growing waiting lists and bring the private market back under control. We must freeze rents and establish national tenancy standards to correct the gross imbalances that exist in our national rental market. We must create an economic model that sees housing as an essential human right and not a commodity.