Penny Allman-Payne (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Every politician in this building, me included, is about to pocket another pay rise. This is being piled on top of already beyond-generous pay, and it's hard to stomach a pay increase when so many people in this community are struggling desperately. How can the Labor government stand by while more and more people across the country are forced into homelessness? My office in Gladstone helps people all day who are on the verge of or already experiencing homelessness—people sleeping in their cars, people couch-surfing with their kids. They are just trying to survive.

Everyone is being hit hard, including older people. The number of older people renting has increased by 73 per cent. This means that folks are being forced out into an unregulated private market where poorly maintained, unsafe and inaccessible rental properties are rife. This means they are also subject to the whims of an uncapped rental market where property developers and landlords call the shots, increasing their profits whenever they choose. We also have an age pension that barely covers the basics, with the cost of housing cutting into that more and more, and this crisis is only going to get worse.

If Labor were serious about tackling the housing crisis, it would phase out the massive tax handouts for property investors that are denying millions of renters the chance to buy a home, and it would invest the savings in a mass build of public housing and coordinate a rent freeze and a cap on rent increases.