Carol Brown (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The incorporated speech read as follows—

I rise today to make my contribution to the First Home Saver Accounts (Further Provisions) Amendment Bill 2008 and the First Home Saver Account Providers Supervisory Levy Imposition Bill 2008.

These two bills deliver the final parts of the first home saver scheme, following the passage of the substantive legislation earlier this year.

When the First Home Saver Accounts Legislation was passed in June 2008 the Treasurer Mr Swan highlighted its importance to first home buyers when he said and I quote:

“The introduction of the First Home Saver Accounts marks an important new beginning in housing policy in Australia. The accounts will help young Australians to once again realise the dream of homeownership.”

Indeed in the lead up to last years election the now Government made addressing the Housing crisis in this country a priority, convening a housing affordability summit and committing to introducing a comprehensive package of initiatives, such as the first home saver initiative, aimed directly at making home ownership in this country more accessible and affordable.

This initiative reflects our commitment, to assisting Australians realise that the great Australian dream of home ownership—something that in recent times has become increasingly out of the reach particularly for younger Australians.

As most of us are well aware, the biggest challenge when it comes to home ownership in this country has traditionally been saving an initial deposit. This remains true, perhaps more than ever.

As the Treasurer explained, the initiatives contained in this bill will provide a tax-effective way for Australians to save for their first home.

Any Australian, aged over 18 and under 65 will be eligible to open an account, so long as they have they not:

• previously purchased a home or built their first home in which they live,
• do not have or have not had previously a first home saver account and
• can provide their tax file number.

Personal contributions can be made by the account holder or any other party.

The account will be supported by government contributions, with the Government contribution being 17 per cent of the first $5,000 of contributions made into the account each year.

This will mean that the Government will give $850 to any first home saver account holder who contributes $5,000 a year.

The first home saver accounts are part of the Governments broader commitments to responsible economic management and assisting Australians with cost of living pressures.

Under this initiative the Government will invest around 1.2 billion over four years to help young Australians realise their dream.

These bills include the measures necessary to make the scheme operational.

These include:

• Amendments to ensure the secrecy provisions to enable Commonwealth agencies to share information they require in order fulfilling their statutory obligations, while ensuring the privacy of the account holder is protected.
• A scheme for dealing with unclaimed money in First Home Saver Accounts will be established. Under this scheme First Home Saver Accounts which have been inactive for seven years, and where the provider has been unable to contact the account holder, will be paid to the Commonwealth. Individuals who later identify themselves to the FHSA provider will be able to reclaim their money.
• Introducing a framework for imposing a levy on FHSA providers to provide funding for Australian Prudential Regulation Authority to carry out its supervision of financial institutions which offer FHSAs.

The Government is also introducing a number of other amendments to ensure the First Home Saver Accounts operate as they were intended. These minor amendments will allow existing laws to interact appropriately with the FHSAs.

The $1.2 Billion First Home Saver Accounts initiative is designed to assist Australians save money for the purchase of their first home, and, as I stated previously, these accounts will form only part of a range of measures this Government is implementing to deal with the current housing affordability crisis.

The Government has shown just how serious it is about tackling the affordable housing problem, by appointing the first ever Minister solely responsible for housing, the Hon Tanya Plibersek.

Since elected, the Government and Minister Plibersek have wasted no time on introducing measures aimed directly at improving housing outcomes for families, whether it be in terms of home ownership, accessing affordable rental properties, or in an increasing number of cases, quite simply ensuring that they actually have a roof over their head.

For many Australians, the family home or access to decent quality housing is a central tenet for many other aspects of life—providing stability, surety, a place in which to develop a sense of community and, of course, a place in which to establish a sense of pride.

For many Australians, many a happy memory has been forged in a place they have called home—whether it was teaching your child to ride a bike or making a home to raise your family, annual Christmas BBQs, or the establishment of successful veggie patch.

Indeed, access to affordable housing plays a crucial role in defining family, community and even national relationships.

In recent years however we have sadly seen a crisis in terms of access to affordable housing develop—with many aspiring home owners being squeezed out of the market and many more renters being unable to access affordable housing solutions.

The result? An increasing number of Australians suffering from what has been termed mortgage or rental stress - with a disproportionate amount of their income being consumed by housing costs.

Even worse is the situation for the estimated 100,000 people in Australia who are currently homeless, with no place to live.

The Rudd Labor Government has a comprehensive long term plan to address the shortfall of affordable housing; because we recognise that finding an affordable home is becoming more difficult in Australia.

As such we have invested $2.2 billion in a number of significant housing initiatives.

National Housing Affordability Fund

The first of these initiatives consists of a $512 million Housing Affordability fund to assist in the construction of new homes, making more affordable dwellings for those who need them.

This $512 million investment over 5 years is designed to provide a partnership with Governments and others across Australia to bring down infrastructure and holding costs for a new house in a new housing development across the nation.

The fund has placed an emphasis on proposals that improve the supply of affordable dwellings, we believe this will save home owners significantly as we will be providing the local investor with grants of up to $10,000 per home to reduce infrastructure barriers and holding costs associated with construction of a new home.

In my home state of Tasmania where affordable housing is such a critical issue the launch of the Housing Affordability Fund has been met with strong praise from, the then State Minister for Housing, the Hon Lara Giddings.

The Tasmanian State Government has already established a new Housing Innovations Unit to work with local councils and other stakeholders to investigate areas of Crown Land which may be available to utilise the Housing Affordability Fund, I am confident the State Governments Housing Innovation Unit and the Federal Governments Housing Affordability Fund will together be able to provide Tasmanians with more affordable housing.

Application guidelines for the Affordability Fund were recently announced by Minister Plibersek and the Prime Minster.

At the launch of the guidelines, the Prime Minster emphasised that aim of the fund was to encourage the building of much needed housing developments for Australians.

National Rental Affordability Scheme

As part of its plan to tackle housing affordability the Government has also announced, the National Rental Affordability Scheme, which will see the Government invest $623 million over the next four years to help stimulate construction of affordable rental properties.

The rising cost of rent has placed increased financial pressure on working families, so this Government will increase the number of affordable rental dwellings available whilst also reducing rental costs for low-to-moderate income households.

The National Rental Affordability Scheme delivers on an election commitment we made to the Australian people last year, by encouraging large scale investment and innovative delivery of affordable housing to try to ensure up to 50,000 affordable rental properties are built over the first four years.

The scheme will be delivered in two phases, with a two year establishment phase from July 2008 which will involve the construction of 11,000 homes and an expansion phase from 2010 to 2012 involving 39,000 homes.

The Government has also made a commitment that if the demand from renters and investors remains strong we will make available a further 50,000 homes from 2012.

To drive this scheme we are offering institutional investors and other eligible bodies annual tax incentives or a grant every year for a period of up to 10 years to ensure the production of these affordable rental homes.

To be eligible for a property built under the National Rental Affordability Scheme, tenants need to be low or moderate income earners, earning below a defined income limit.

We believe this scheme will provide many Australians struggling with the rising costs of rent the chance to live in an affordable rental home.

Homes for the Homeless

Also in our battle to provide housing for all Australians the Government will invest $100 million over the next four years, and another $50 million in 2012/13 to build 600 new homes for the homeless.

This investment forms part of the Government’s A Place to Call Home strategy, the homeless will be able to move directly into housing instead of going into refuges and will receive tenancy and support services.

The A Place to Call Home strategy will help the homeless break the cycle of moving in and out of homeless support services and help them re establish themselves in society.

Minster Plibersek has also released a Green paper, on homelessness, and conducted extensive consultation, with the White Paper due out this month which will set out the Governments plan of action to tackle homelessness until 2020.

Increasing the supply of land

Finally, the Government is also currently in the process of implementing its election commitment to release surplus commonwealth land for the purpose of building new houses and communities. With a report due in the New Year, this promises to provide another means of tackling the housing affordability crisis.

In support of this, Minister Plibersek earlier this year announced the appointment of Dr O’Donald as the inaugural chair of the National Housing Supply Council.

The Council is due to publish its State of Supply report to analyse the adequacy of rates of construction and land supply in Australia over the next twenty years.

The council will also contribute to the Governments approach to the sale of surplus Commonwealth land.

Therefore the work of the council will enable the Government to better assess current and future demand for housing across Australia.

The Rudd Labor Government is aware of the large scale investment required to rectify the availability of affordable housing in Australia.

All of these initiatives form part of the Governments comprehensive and coordinated approach tackling to the issue of housing affordability in Australia.

Such initiatives, including, of course, the one that is the key subject of this bill should be applauded.

Need I remind those opposite that this is in stark contrast to the situation the Rudd Government inherited a little over 10 months ago?

When this Government came to office housing costs had increased significantly and were spiralling out of control, it had become extremely difficult for Australians to purchase their own home.

Indeed when taking over office at the end of last year the average cost of an Australian home had increased to a staggering 7½ times the average annual wage.

This is in stark contrast to 1996, when the average cost of a home then was four times the annual average wage.

This represents a dramatic increase in the cost of housing, the Government recognised how out of reach owning your own home had become to average Australians, so we set about introducing measures to ensure owning your own home once again become accessible to working Australians.

In the last decade under the watch of those opposite, we have also seen the average mortgage for a first home buyer double from $107,000 in 1996 to reach $248,000 by the end of last year. Back in 1996 mortgage holders were spending 15.2 per cent of their total income on repayments, by the end of last year this had risen to upwards of 30 per cent.

These figures highlight how in the last decade there has been a huge increase in what first time home buyers were having to outlay for the purchase of their first home. With this in mind the Government decided to introduce First Home Saver Accounts to help encourage personal savings whilst also providing some extra financial help to first time home buyers.

Before introducing the First Home Saver Accounts the Government wanted to receive public feedback to ensure the best system possible, so earlier this year we released a consultation paper outlining the proposed features of the accounts and how they would operate.

In seeking comments on the paper the Government received over 150 submissions from individuals, businesses and organisations.

The Rudd Labor Government undertook a comprehensive consultation process, the feedback we received was extremely helpful to provide more effective public policy. In response to the issues and suggestions raised by the various stakeholders during the consultation process a number of improvements have been made to the FHSAs.

The scheme is in the final stages of preparation and will become operational on the 1 October 2008, we hope the scheme will encourage all Australians to save for a deposit for their first home, we believe that the accounts will assist people to make disciplined savings to invest in the great Australian dream, of owning your own home.

The First Home Saver Account provides an extremely effective and fiscally rewarding program for first home buyers, a couple earning average yearly incomes both putting aside 10 per cent of their income into individual FHSAs after five years would be able to save a deposit of more than $88,000.

As the program demonstrates disciplined saving can provide average Australians with a wonderful opportunity to save a substantial amount for use as a deposit for the purchase of their first home.

The Government’s First Home Saver Accounts are a critical measure to help provide Australians with more affordable housing options.

Therefore I commend this bill to the chamber and ask for its full support.