Jenny Ware (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That this House:

(1) notes that:

(a) National Cabinet agreed to a national target to build 1.2 million new well-located homes over five years from 1 July 2024; and

(b) the New South Wales Government has conceded that it cannot reach its agreed housing targets of 75,000 new dwellings a year over the next five years;

(2) expresses concern that, as a flow-on consequence, the Commonwealth Government cannot reach its target to construct 1.2 million new homes over five years;

(3) acknowledges that:

(a) the Government's pipedream figure for new housing did not take into account:

(i) record high numbers of liquidations in the building and construction industry;

(ii) a shortage of available construction materials;

(iii) increasing construction material costs; and

(iv) a shortage of skilled tradespeople; and

(b) the Government refused to intervene in the dispute between the Maritime Union of Australia and DP World at container terminals, leading to a 50,000 container backlog and further exacerbating construction material shortages; and

(4) further notes that the Government has:

(a) legislated a failed housing plan; and

(b) ultimately demonstrated that it cannot develop any policy to address the housing crisis, let alone deliver it.

This motion concerns our housing affordability crisis, which is a national crisis. Whether it be homeownership or rentals, housing is largely unaffordable for most Australians that do not already own their own home—for Australians on an average wage of $85,000, for our first responders, for those who work in aged care. This is a crisis across our country. Millennials and generation Z have mostly given up on owning their own homes. I hear of teenagers being stressed, not about missing out on Taylor Swift concert tickets but about concerns that they will not be able to afford to live in the communities where they grew up, and this is a national shame.

In my first speech in this place I spoke of my commitment to addressing housing affordability, and whilst ever the good people of the electorate of Hughes provide me with the privilege of serving in this place I will be committed to this and I will continue to speak about this, because in my electorate this is a massive issue. After cost of living, housing affordability remains the biggest issue that people talk to me about when I'm out door-knocking, when I'm doing mobile offices and when they email me. As an example, based on figures from CoreLogic, as of July last year, to buy a house in Moorebank in my electorate you need $1.2 million; in Holsworthy, $1 million; in Oyster Bay, $1.7 million; in Jannali, $1.5 million; in Illawong, $1.6 million; and in Sutherland, $1.4 million.

Price is always determined by supply and demand. That is year 8 economics. The high cost of housing—the reason that we have the housing affordability problem in this country—is largely due to a lack of supply, and this is what this motion is about.

The Minister for Housing and the Prime Minister have said over and over again that they will deliver 1.2 million new homes over five years. So said National Cabinet. That's 240,000 new homes every year. But, a bare few months later, Labor Premier Chris Minns, in my home state of New South Wales, conceded his government cannot meet its housing targets. The New South Wales Premier, in the country's most populous state, has at least been honest. He has said New South Wales can't meet those targets. That means the federal government cannot meet its targets of 1.2 million.

Other supply factors that the Minister for Housing, Minister Collins, and also the Labor government overall have been silent about are things like the record number of liquidations in the building and construction industry. According to ASIC, there were nearly 2,000 construction insolvencies in the six months to September 2023—1,810. There is a massive shortage of construction materials, which has not been helped by the fight between the maritime workers union and DP World, to whose assistance the government did not come in relation to that. That saw 50,000 containers backlogged on wharves. Many of those containers contained construction materials. So we have that. We also have a massive increase in the cost of construction materials—30 per cent, the tradies in my electorate tell me. There is a massive shortage of tradespeople. We've all spoken, on both sides of this place, about the shortage of trades. There are also the delays and red tape involved in releasing land at both the state and local government levels.

None of these issues has been effectively addressed by the government, and that is why I say that the government has legislated a failed housing plan. That is why I say that the government cannot deliver its 1.2 million homes in five years. The government has demonstrated that it cannot develop, let alone deliver, a policy that will address housing supply and housing affordability, particularly for our millennials and our generation Z, into the future.

Andrew Wilkie (Clark, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the motion seconded?

Melissa McIntosh (Lindsay, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the motion and reserve my right to speak.

Jerome Laxale (Bennelong, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

For a decade, the Liberals adopted a do-nothing approach on housing, staring a crisis in the eye without doing much to address it. For years, Australia has grappled with a housing affordability crisis which has been exacerbated by the lack of decisive action from the previous government. Under their watch the housing crisis got worse. The lack of action from the former government made a bad situation worse. Now it's harder to buy a home for first-home buyers, for young families and for older people as well. While the former government indulged in political rhetoric and empty promises, ordinary Australians grappled with the harsh realities of unaffordable housing, dwindling supply and lack of government support, and now families are forced to make the difficult choice between paying higher rents and being pushed to the fringes of major cities in search of more affordable housing options.

The failure of the previous government to address these pressing issues left countless Australians trapped in a cycle of housing insecurity and financial hardship with no relief in sight. Their negligence has left us with significant challenges that simply cannot be resolved overnight. The housing crisis that they allowed to fester for years cannot be swept under the rug or fixed quickly. The damage inflicted by their negligence runs deep, impacting the lives of millions of Australians who continue to struggle with the high cost of housing and the shortage of affordable housing options. It's abundantly clear that urgent and decisive measures are needed to address the root causes of the housing crisis and provide relief to those who have been left behind.

Australians elected this government to clean up the Liberals' mess, and that's what we've started to do. Since May 2022, this Labor government has continually demonstrated a genuine commitment to addressing Australia's housing challenges head-on. Despite the political games and stalling that the Liberals and their new friends in the Australian Greens want to play with the housing crisis, we are a government that is committed to doing something about this.

Safe and affordable housing is central to the security and dignity of all Australians. Under the National Housing Accord, all states and territories have agreed to an ambitious target of building 1.2 million new homes over five years. And, yes, it is an ambitious target, but it's one that we are determined to achieve. It's ambitious because it needs to be. It would be great if we could wind back that wasted decade and start fixing this problem 10 years ago, but we can't. We're not sitting idle.

On top of that target, the Albanese government has allocated $3 billion for the New Homes Bonus, to get the states to meet and exceed their housing targets. Furthermore, the government has invested in the Housing Support Program, a $500 million funding initiative to kick start housing supply in well-located areas. This program will not only stimulate construction activity but will also ensure that new homes are built in places where they are needed most.

To build these homes, we need workers, so the Albanese government has taken steps to address the shortage of skilled construction workers, which is a key bottleneck in the housing supply chain. By providing fee-free TAFE and through targeted skilled migration, the government is investing in the future of Australia's construction workforce. These investments are paying off, with trade commencements up almost 20 per cent in the government's first year—a clear sign of progress and momentum in the construction sector.

We on this side are also investing in building 40,000 new social and affordable rentals through the Housing Australia Future Fund, and a further 4,000 through the Social Housing Accelerator. The Housing Accord represents the most significant housing reform agenda in a generation—a coordinated effort with states and territories and local government to boost housing supply, improve housing affordability and ensure that all Australians have a safe place to call home.

Those opposite like to come into this place and put forward questions and motions trying to undermine what the government are doing. They seek to blame everyone but themselves for this housing crisis. We saw it today in question time: two disgraceful questions from the opposition seeking to blame migrants and migration for 10 years of housing inaction. Instead of working with the government, we know that the Liberals and the Greens will play politics with this—block or vote against housing solutions—but we'll continue to get on with the job. There's much more to do, but we'll do it.

Melissa McIntosh (Lindsay, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would like to thank my good friend the member for Hughes for moving this motion highlighting the Albanese Labor government's long shot of providing 1.2 million additional homes over five years. We doubt it will happen and Australians doubt it too, particularly when the New South Wales government has conceded it cannot reach its new build target of 75,000 each year over the next five years. Housing pressures are so topical across greater Sydney, whether you represent Penrith, like I do, or parts of Liverpool and the Sutherland shire like the member for Hughes.

Young people and families are being impacted the most by the three crises that the Albanese is doing nothing real about to tackle. There is a cost-of-living crisis, a mental-health crisis and a housing crisis—a triple whammy that Aussies are battling through under the dark economic headwinds facing mums, dads and small-business owners across Western Sydney and, indeed, the whole country.

Let's take a step back and remember what the Labor party's commitment was on housing at the last election. They said they would get Help to Buy up and running by 1 January 2023. Well, they should have said that they'd halve Medicare-subsidised psychology sessions on that date, because that is the only thing that would have been the truth. Instead, we have Help to Buy before the parliament right now, in February 2024—more than a year later.

It's looking, possibly, to be an election year, with the Albanese Labor government limping to the finish line. In their armour, they want to tick a box and tell the Australian people they tried when it came to housing, but, of course, this program won't really get up and running for a while, and, if it flops, they'll be able to play the 'we ran out of time' card. What Labor forgot to mention at the last election was that, for the scheme to work, all states and territories need to legislate it. Good luck getting that through in time to create any effect soon. The government went to the last election failing to mention that most states already have a shared-equity scheme in place. In New South Wales, we have the Shared Equity Home Buyer Helper scheme. I'm informed by the shadow housing minister that in New South Wales 94 per cent of places in the scheme are still available.

Australians don't want the government owning part of their homes but they do want a government that will implement policies to support first homebuyers and those needing a roof over their heads. The National Housing Finance and Investment Corporation is something that the coalition government put into place. We provided more than $2.9 billion of low-cost loans and supported more than 15,000 social and affordable dwellings across the country. As someone who came into this place having worked in the community housing sector, I understand how vital such financial assistance is to build homes for those who need assistance. I'm informed that we're seeing one in three first homebuyers supported by the coalition's Home Guarantee Scheme. This scheme helps families with deposits as low as five per cent, and single parents with deposits as low as two per cent, to get assistance to enter the market and get the home that they need. And we all know that saving for a deposit is a daunting experience, but our first home super saver scheme is helping tens of thousands of young Aussie families accelerate their deposit.

Let's not forget that the former coalition government's stimulus for the housing and construction sector during COVID saw 137,000 home builder applications which generated $120 billion of economic activity and helped the sector survive in the aftermath of lockdowns. That's why it's such a shame that we have a Labor government presiding over the lowest levels of dwelling construction in over a decade. Forecasts for national and new home builds and renovation activity are slowing even further. You only have to drive down the streets of Western Sydney to see that renovations are slowing. With a housing minister missing in action and the government's key piece of housing policy being introduced in possibly the last year of this parliamentary term, no wonder we're seeing record high numbers of liquidations in the building and construction sector.

Compounding this is the shortage of available construction materials and their increased costs. It's such a shame that this Albanese Labor government is failing our country when it comes to fixing the housing crisis, not only in Western Sydney but in every single pocket of every community we represent.

Tania Lawrence (Hasluck, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There is a housing crisis in Australia, and local, state and federal governments must all strive together to solve it. In a complex society, I believe that government has a duty to provide adequate housing for every person, so I thank the member for Hughes for raising the issue of housing with this motion, as housing is an important issue and one which we must address continually in this place.

The motion itself, of course, is quite wrongheaded, and I speak against it for two reasons. Firstly, the motion by the member for Hughes fails to address causes. Does anyone actually think that the housing crisis which exists currently suddenly arose over the last two years? No, they absolutely do not. The member for Hughes has conveniently omitted the fact that we have a housing crisis today due to the inadequate responses by federal and state governments to the issue over a much longer period. The member for Hughes was elected at the same time as I was, in 2022, and perhaps doesn't feel that she should have to carry the can for the inadequate coalition administrations that preceded us. But what is clear, and what we have been reminded of by the sordid Nemesis program on the ABC, is that many, or most, coalition members over the nine years before 2022 were much too busy focusing on and hating each other; they preferred that to actually doing the work and making the commitments required to put a roof over anyone's head. Secondly, the motion fails to recognise the work done in two short years by this government, often working closely with the states and sometimes with the Independents and other parties. This is quite surprising, given especially that the Liberal and National parties manage to find themselves getting in the way and slowing this very important legislation down.

So it's a hopeless motion, and one from a party which does not in fact appear to have any policies in this or any other area. I've got some advice, though, for the member for Hughes. Two things are true in politics, and one is that governments must stand on their record come election time—and I'll come to our government's record presently. But what was the coalition's record in housing? It seemed to be around encouraging people without wealth to raid their superannuation balances. The other thing is that prospective governments must offer policy alternatives. Time is running out for the Liberal and National parties to actually create some policies before the next election.

The Albanese government was elected with a mandate to act on housing, and, notwithstanding the lack of respect for the mandate from others in parliament and especially from the coalition, who loved to bleat about mandate when they were in government, we have acted. We have created the Housing Australia Future Fund—$10 billion in perpetuity to support social and affordable housing. The expanded Home Guarantee Scheme is also helping a growing number of key workers, such as teachers, nurses and social workers, to purchase a home, with around 7,720 guarantees issued to key workers in 2022-23, up 37 per cent already from 2021-22. And we announced the $2 billion Social Housing Accelerator in June 2023, which will increase Australia's housing supply by creating thousands of social homes across Australia. We've helped over 10,000 people in regional Australia with the Regional First Home Buyer Guarantee in just its first year, providing a government guarantee of up to 15 per cent for eligible homebuyers so that regional Australians, with a deposit of as little as five per cent, can avoid paying lenders mortgage insurance. We've worked with states and territories to deliver the Help to Buy scheme, supporting up to 40,000 low- and middle-income families to purchase a home of their own through an equity contribution.

This is important work, and I'm sure it's appreciated by one house family after another. It's important all over Australia, not less so in Hasluck, where we have over 53 per cent of families paying a mortgage and a further 18 per cent renting. This week we have the Help to Buy bill in the House. The opposition didn't exactly cover itself in glory with opposing the Housing Australia Future Fund, and it's looking like it's repeating the error with the Help to Buy bill. This is the opposition that's always happy to bleat on about having a mandate when they get elected. The member for Hughes pretends to be interested in housing policy, but she should have supported the Housing Australia Future Fund bill. She should support every other bill brought before this parliament that is aimed at relieving the housing crisis, or she should bring her own bill, rather than motions like this one.

I congratulate Minister Collins on the work she has done thus far to assist tens of thousands of Australians into a home on the great legacy that the HAFF will leave to future generations and on the current bill, which will bring homeownership within the reach of many people who would not be able to access the market without it.

Helen Haines (Indi, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Hughes for this motion. I'm very pleased to speak about housing. I like to speak about housing. It's so important. Many of us are deeply concerned about housing supply, especially in regional, rural and remote Australia. During the most recent census period, which includes the COVID-19 lockdowns, regional Australia saw a net population gain of 166,000 people. The trend is continuing. The most recent Regional Movers Index, developed by the Regional Australia institute and the Commonwealth Bank, shows it remains 11.7 per cent higher than in prepandemic levels. For years, regional and rural Australians were told, 'Build it, and they will come.' Well, they've come, and we haven't built it. Put simply, we do not have enough affordable housing. We don't have enough social housing. We don't have enough rental housing. We don't have enough diverse housing, and we don't have enough of the critical enabling infrastructure to service any new housing.

Rental vacancy rates in regional Australia hovers at around one per cent, and the median regional house values have increased by over 54 per cent since 2020 and last year. In my regional electorate of Indi, I'm constantly hearing about and seeing the devastating consequences of this lack of supply. My electorate's biggest community housing organisation, Beyond Housing, recently told me that 4,000 people across Indi have unmet housing needs. It's sadly not hard to believe this. For the first time in my over 35 years of living in Indi, I'm seeing people sleeping rough like I've simply never seen before. So I, along with many, say that the government's aim of 1.2 million homes over five years is not just a target; it's a must-do. But we need to come at it from all angles. We need enough tradies to build the homes. We need the right infrastructure in place to support growing communities. We need to attract investors, and we need a greater diversity in future housing developments, including medium-density housing developments in regional Australia. These were some of the key recommendations made by the over-300 delegates at the National Regional Housing Summit held a couple of weeks ago here in Canberra. Local councils, community housing providers, lenders and real estate agents came together not just to describe the housing crisis in regional, rural and remote Australia but to offer solutions.

I want to focus on one of the summit's key recommendations: dedicated and increased funding for regional local governments for critical housing infrastructure. Since 2022, I have been calling for the government to fund a $2 billion regional housing infrastructure fund to do just this. It is not sexy to talk about it but the key to more housing supply in the regions is providing local governments with grant funding for sewerage, for drainage, for pavement. The lack of a building and construction workforce is certainly also a key handbrake on more housing. But when I talk to my local building companies and housing developers, they consistently tell me that the No. 1 thing they need is a lot more lots that are connected to the water mains and the sewerage.

But with a small ratepayer base, the local councils in regional and rural areas simply do not have the funs to build this infrastructure on their own. They need a leg-up from government, which is where my regional housing infrastructure fund comes in. I have not pulled $2 billion out of thin air. We need at least 30,000 new homes to meet the demand in regional Australia and it costs around $75,000 to build the infrastructure needed to unlock a new home. This means that more than $2 billion is required to meet that demand.

I acknowledge that the government has recognised the need for critical enabling infrastructure to address the housing shortage through the Housing Support Program, and this program was announced last year using almost exactly my language. But this $500 million is for all of Australia and it will force small regional councils to compete against their metropolitan counterparts. What the government has announced is still a long way off delivering what the one-third of Australians who live outside of the metropolitan areas in rural and regional Australia, frankly, deserve.

Now, the opposition talk a lot about the government's failed housing plans, but I am not seeing them put forward one single solution of their own. As an independent, I did not come to this place to only make complaints; I came here with solutions. Those at the forefront of the regional housing crisis back the regional housing infrastructure fund that I put forward and it is time that members of this place, both the opposition and the government, did so too.

Sally Sitou (Reid, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Hughes for this motion. I think she is perhaps the only member from those opposite who actually cares about housing, because if we are to look at their record, look at what they did on housing, it clearly demonstrates that they had very little interest in addressing the housing affordability crisis that was brewing.

The Abbott government abolished the National Housing Supply Council. The council was established under the Rudd Labor government to monitor housing demand, supply and affordability in Australia. It gave us a better understanding of the problem. Now that is gone. The former housing minister, the member for Deakin, failed to convene a meeting of state and territory housing ministers. It begs the question: what was he doing when he was housing minister? This is a wicked challenge that requires three levels of government working together—development approvals at the council level, planning policy at the state level, infrastructure spend at the state and federal levels. We need three levels of government working together yet the previous minister for housing could not even get everyone in the same room in the five years that he was housing minister.

This motion here talks about the lack of skilled workers. I agree with the member for Hughes because there is a critical lack of skilled workers, particularly in the construction sector. But let's look at how long it takes to complete an apprenticeship—three to four years. Some apprenticeships take six years. So if we go back three to four years, who was in government then? Those opposite. This skills crisis that those opposite talk about, and which we readily admit to, is a skills crisis that was brewing, again, for a long time and that those opposite failed to address.

We, on this side of the House, are doing the hard work to address the skills shortage. We are providing fee-free TAFE. If you want to do a cert III in bricklaying, that's free. A cert II in construction is free. We are making the hard choices and hard decisions to ensure that we've got the skilled workers to complete the necessary construction to address the housing affordability crisis.

The one idea we have from those opposite, so far, is superannuation. This is their one golden ticket, their one golden egg that they go to every time there's an issue that they have to pay for. They go and raid super balances. Again, it's a bad idea because housing experts, finance experts and economic experts all agree that this won't solve the issue of housing affordability. In fact, it's likely to make it worse because you're adding to demand.

Ultimately, a key part of the housing affordability crisis is the lack of supply. That's why it is a key plank in what the Albanese Labor government is doing to address the housing affordability issue. We are increasing supply. We're doing that through the Housing Affordability Future Fund, we're giving incentives for build-to-rent, and, importantly, we are financing the National Housing Infrastructure Facility to ensure that we are building the critical infrastructure that is required when you build new homes—things like public transport and utilities. That's something that the former New South Wales government failed to do when they were building in greenfield sites and failing to provide adequate education facilities or roads.

The other three major areas that we're concentrating on include providing direct assistance to the most vulnerable through our 15 per cent increase in rental assistance and institutional reform by providing national leadership. We've reconvened the National Housing Supply and Affordability Council to ensure that we have evidence based recommendations, and we have finally convened state and territory housing ministers. We are also assisting first home buyers through the expanded First Home Guarantee and Help to Buy schemes.

In Australia, we have major iconic infrastructure, such as the Sydney Harbour Bridge, the Opera House, the Snowy Hydro. We are a country obsessed with major infrastructure projects, and I think our next one should be housing.

Andrew Wallace (Fisher, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I was the chair of the Social Policy and Legal Affairs Committee in the last parliament, for a period of it anyway, and we did a very extensive inquiry in relation to housing and homelessness. As you may be aware, I was a builder, a carpenter and joiner by trade, and a barrister who specialised in construction law. Apart from my eight years in this place, I've made a living out of the building industry in one way, shape or form. I know the industry pretty well. And I know that the building and construction industry is on its knees in Queensland and in much of Australia. They're struggling because they can't get materials. They're struggling because they can't get trades. There is absolute a very significant skills shortage at the moment, and it's a skills shortage that has been going on not just through this government or the last government; I'm talking about a skills shortage over the last 20 or even 30 years.

There has been a very significant change in the way this government—in fact, our country—operates, particularly in relation to apprentices. You can't have an industry of the future if you don't train the skills of the future. Sadly, over the last several decades, we've seen a move away from apprenticeship based training in this country. We have seen a real dearth, and, particularly under this government, we've seen an incredible drop-off in the number of apprentices. But I do concede that this has been going on over a long period of decades. When I make my way around and talk to people on building sites and talk to my old mates in the game, there has been a very significant shift in the way that builders operate. There is a real reluctance to put apprentices on these days. As someone who was an apprentice and who also used to employ apprentices, I understand that. It's a big commitment, particularly for a small operation to take on a young person for four years. The old term was 'indentured', and that's exactly what they are. They are indentured to their master or mistress for four years. It's a long time.

We are an industry that is changing daily. It's boom or bust. The building industry has ever been thus—boom or bust. I've seen a few booms. I've certainly seen a few busts. It is a very tough way to make a dollar. What we are seeing now is that those chickens are coming home to roost. The building industry just simply cannot keep up with the number of homes that we need to build. When we were in government we did some valiant work, I have to say, through things like the HomeBuilder program. After COVID hit, the industry was facing a valley of death. I spoke with the then housing minister. It was mainly him, but I fed some information to him, and HomeBuilder was created.

HomeBuilder was a tremendous program that enabled a lot of builders to keep working through the pandemic, because they were facing an economic cliff; there's absolutely no doubt about that. Builders would have failed and gone over that cliff in their thousands, and HomeBuilder saved a great number of them. But what we're seeing now is that the number of insolvencies are increasing out of sight. That is of great concern to me because it's an industry that is very close and dear to my heart. I've seen it time and time again, both as a practitioner and as a builder: these men and women take great pride in their work.

Where I'm going with all of this is that if we don't have builders, if we don't have subcontractors, if we don't have apprentices, we can't build the homes for Australians. What that does is drive up the costs. It's supply and demand. If you have fewer people doing the work, it drives up the costs of building materials and labour, and that makes it even more unaffordable for Australians.

The coalition government did some fantastic work when we were in government. I want to congratulate the former housing minister, because he did some terrific work. (Time expired)

Tracey Roberts (Pearce, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We have been progressing the debate on the Help to Buy bill and highlighting other aspects of the Albanese Labor government's housing reforms, and yet here we are with this motion before us. Truly, it beggars belief that those opposite just can't find it within themselves to support measures that are designed to assist Australians achieve housing security. I would have thought that the member for the electorate of Hughes, which is located in the southern and south-western suburbs of Sydney, would welcome such reforms on behalf of her 150,000-plus residents.

A decade of little action by the former Liberal-National government, along with a pandemic and global issues, have left us with significant challenges across the country. That said, we can't afford to put our heads in the sand and do nothing, which appears to be the approach of the former government. That is why the Albanese Labor government struck the National Housing Accord between the Commonwealth, the state and territory governments, local government, institutional investors and the construction sector to address the nation's housing challenges. All states and territories have agreed to extend the National Housing Accord target to 1.2 million new homes over five years from 1 July 2024. This target is ambitious because it needs to be.

The Albanese Labor government understands that safe and affordable housing are central to the security and dignity of all Australians. We also understand that we need long-term investment and reform to boost the construction of new homes. The Albanese Labor government's expansive housing agenda will support the states and territories and the construction industry to significantly boost the supply of new homes. We are working to improve the supply of skilled construction workers through access to free-free TAFE and targeted migration. We have added an additional 300,000 fee-free TAFE places from 2024 to 2026 for priority areas, including construction, and we are working on supply chain issues and investing in more locally manufactured products, including measures to boost timber supply.

It is worth reiterating a few points about what we are doing to help Australians achieve their dream of homeownership. I'll start with the $10 billion Housing Australia Future Fund. This fund will support 40,000 new social and affordable rental homes right across the country in its first five years, including 4,000 homes through the Social Housing Accelerator for women and children impacted by family and domestic violence or older women at risk of homelessness. The fund will also deliver $200 million for the repair, maintenance and improvement of housing in remote Indigenous communities, $100 million for crisis and transitional housing options for women and children at risk, and $30 million to build housing for veterans who are experiencing homelessness or at risk of homelessness.

As stated previously, we are working with the states and territories to help them meet the ambitious new national target to build 1.2 million new homes over five years, through the $3 billion New Homes Bonus and the Housing Support Program, a $500 million competitive funding program for local and state governments which will help kickstart housing supply in well located areas. States will have flexibility in how they permanently boost social housing stock with this funding, including new builds, expanding existing programs, or renovating or refurbishing existing currently uninhabitable housing stock. We have a National Housing and Homelessness Agreement and have already delivered $181.9 million to Western Australia in 2023. This includes funding for homelessness services.

We said we would move quickly and effectively to address our nation's housing issues, and we are, with the most significant, carefully considered housing reform agenda in a generation, so more Australians will have a safe place to call home. There will be new homes for people to buy, new homes to rent and more affordable housing for those in need. Unlike those opposite, who just say no to every policy idea put before them, we are getting on with the job at hand, and that is particularly so in Western Australia.

Planning reform is long overdue. The changes being implemented will make it easier, quicker and cheaper to build a house. They will help to improve the availability of well-located land to accommodate more housing. The government's housing reforms are considered, comprehensive, guided by expert advice and delivered in partnership with all governments, with industry and with community sectors. I do not support the motion.

Andrew Wilkie (Clark, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The time allotted for this debate has now expired. The debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting.