Chris Evans (WA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

The question, if I understood it correctly, is regarding national partnerships. Of course you do not enter into the budget figures for partnerships that are yet to be negotiated, but the reality is that we are putting $6 billion investment into social housing construction and it is delivering more than 21,000 affordable homes and, of course, supporting construction jobs. Nineteen thousand of these new homes have been completed, with the remainder to be finished in 2012. The $4.5 billion National Rental Affordability Scheme will increase the stock of more affordable rental properties by 50,000 homes. So there is an awful lot of effort and investment into trying to tackle the housing and homelessness problems this nation confronts, but it is a big job because we were left with a very big deficit. (Time expired)