Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Bartlett for raising this issue. It is a national issue because state Labor governments occupy every state and territory government around this country and it is an absolute disgrace what they have been doing to first home buyers and to home buyers in general in this country. I thank Senator Bartlett again for raising this issue because I raised it just a few weeks ago in the Senate. During my speech I talked about what this government has done.

The first thing people need in order to be able to afford to buy a home is a job. We have the lowest unemployment rate in 32 years in this country, provided by a strong economy. That enables people to borrow money to buy a home, and they have done that with confidence under this government. And, talking about what we have done for the first home buyers, 926,000 people have benefited by purchasing a home with the support of a first home buyers grant. It is trite to suggest we have not done anything to help people get into housing. We are helping them with jobs. We are allowing them to confidently plan with a strong economy. We are helping them to get first home buyer assistance. As to rental accommodation, Senator Bartlett said we have done nothing to assist people through the rental process. That is simply not true. The Commonwealth government has committed $4.75 billion over five years under the Commonwealth-State Housing Agreement to support rental accommodation. This includes approximately $93 million over the last financial year for the Aboriginal Rental Housing Program.

The essence of housing affordability is supported by industry groups and by this government. So it comes back to the robber barons who are running our state governments. They are out there seeing the purses of the hardworking men and women of Australia and saying: ‘Open them up because we’re going to empty them. We’re going to fleece you with stamp duty. We’re going to fleece you by withholding land.’ Instead of releasing land for the purpose of ensuring affordable housing, they are holding land and restricting the supply for the purpose of profit. What they are doing is an absolute disgrace. When someone finally manages to convince a state Labor government that they need to expand development and allow people to go and live in their own home, which is part of the great Australian ideal, what do they do? They say to the developer: ‘Hang on a second. Not only are you going to pay twice as much as we paid for this land just a few years ago; we are going to make you pay all the up-front costs as well.’

The state Labor governments across this country are absolutely remiss. They have proved that they are inept and incompetent, as is Labor generally, about managing resources and finances across this country. They have an absolute windfall of money flowing from the Commonwealth to support them with infrastructure, with the development of land and with all the great needs that exist in every state. And what do they do with it? They think the best thing they can do is employ a few more people in the public service, create a bit more bureaucracy and shuffle the papers and that is going to rebuild the economy. Australians can see through this.

This Labor Party mob over the other side who purport to be an alternative government say, ‘Trust us; we’re different.’ But we do not have to look too far—if we go around the whole country the only things we see are spendthrifts, wastefulness and ridiculous amounts of money being wasted on all sorts of silly schemes. The people hurt by this activity are the people of Australia, and they will see through it. They will say that they cannot understand why the Australian Labor Party purports to support a strong economy and yet has demonstrated something very different. ‘Do as I say, not as I do,’ is the Labor Party’s mantra on this. If you in the Labor Party are seriously going to go down the path of wanting to make housing affordable, you should get onto your state Labor comrades and say, ‘Reduce stamp duty; reduce land tax; encourage investment into private enterprise.’ Or are you going to take us back to the situation under the Keating and Hawke government when you abolished negative gearing and created a rental crisis such as this country had never seen? You want to get onto them about reducing their burdens and overrequirements for development and infrastructure if you want to make housing affordable in this country. This government, as I have said, has already made enormous inroads into that. And part of that is trying to provide relief from the $9.6 billion worth of stamp duty that was fleeced from the poor people of Australia in the last financial year. It is an absolute disgrace.

Homeownership is very important to the social fabric of this country and cannot be underestimated. The benefits are not purely economic. It is not just about people providing for their future, having a nice place to retire or something that they can call their own. It is about community building. And that is what this government has been about—building communities, providing support for families and ensuring that every Australian has a fair go. It is making sure that Australians have jobs. It is making sure they can plan for their futures and that they can look after their children appropriately.

The Labor Party have failed at every turn. They have not only failed to support the policies we have put forward over the last 11 years; they have failed to haul in their comrades at the state level. They are high taxing. They are high spending. They cannot manage a budget—they have never been able to manage a budget. They are absolutely wasteful. Their economic policy is to try and copy ours, but they have not managed to do that at any turn. They keep having internal brawls of the Left, the far Left, the extreme Left, the communist Left—whatever Left they have got going—with their extreme Right, their radical Right, their middle people, their machine factions. Someone has got to kick them into gear. Do you know what? If someone bothered to kick Kevin Rudd in the backside they would not be hurting Kevin Rudd; they would be hurting one of the union stooges who is right behind him, trying to prop him up. This is what is rotten about the Labor Party over there on the other side—they are only relevant to the union movement. They are not concerned at all about the people of Australia and the home buyers of Australia.

This government provides tax relief. We represent fiscal management. We provide help for families. What do Labor governments do at a state level? Nothing. They pass the buck. They are running down services. They are not providing appropriate land releases into development zones. They are not providing stamp duty relief. In fact in South Australia, appallingly, as house prices have gone up they have been increasing stamp duty so that there are no exemptions for people buying the average priced home. If you wanted to encourage people to go to a state where we need workers and where we have a lot of developments going on, you would think you would provide something to attract them to go there. Not the state Labor governments.

The state Labor governments are cut from the same cloth as the purported alternative government on the other side of the chamber, and it is a rotten cloth. It is moth-eaten. It is 1950s socialist dogma hiding behind the cosy smiling face of Mr Rudd. It is very dangerous. The best friend that Australian families and homebuyers have had is this government. Nine hundred and twenty-six thousand families and individuals have benefited from our support for first home buyers. We have cut taxation in order to enable them to afford the wasteful expenditure of the state Labor governments and the Labor administrations. And every single time we have taken a step forward to try to help people, who has opposed us? Has our effort been supported by the other side? No, it has not. We have had to drag them kicking and screaming to every reform that has enabled Australia and the people of Australia to benefit from one of the strongest economies that we have ever seen.

Do you think that we can afford to let the federal Labor opposition squander our prosperity? They will send this country into a near bankrupt state if they continue with the ridiculous policies espoused by the Labor parties across the country. The proof is there for the people of Australia to see. If you want a credible, viable, sustainable economy in this country and you want to see more people being able to afford their own homes, then a coalition government is the only way to go. The proof is in pudding. Look around the states and you will see how high taxing and wasteful they are. (Time expired)