Katy Gallagher (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to respond to notice of motion No. 700, concerning orders for the production of documents Nos 563 and 676. Those motions sought the tabling of documents prepared by external consultants engaged to identify planning reforms that states and territories should consider under the Housing Accord.

The Treasurer's response to order No. 563 detailed the government's public interest immunity claim over a report on the grounds that disclosure of the document would have the potential to cause prejudice to future consultation and harm relations between the Commonwealth and the states.

In response to order No. 676, the Treasurer has again advised that one document has been identified as within scope. As the document had been considered by the Council on Federal Financial Relations, consultation with the states was undertaken. Several states explicitly objected to its release, citing the potential to harm collaborative relationships. Consequently, the government has again claimed public interest immunity in response to order No. 676 on the grounds that disclosure of the document would risk prejudicing future consultation and harming relations between the Commonwealth and the states.

The Commonwealth's partnership with states and territories underpins the federation, supported by $175 billion annually in federal funding. Releasing intergovernmental documents of this nature risks undermining trust, reducing the frankness of future consultations and compromising the delivery of initiatives like the Housing Accord. The government must balance the oversight role of the Senate against the imperative of protecting the integrity of intergovernmental co-operation. The Housing Accord represents a vital step forward towards addressing housing affordability, and our continued focus is on collaborative solutions supported by detailed reporting to the parliament. The Treasurer's public interest immunity claim is consistent with longstanding principles and necessitated by the sensitivities of intergovernmental relations.

Andrew Bragg (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Home Ownership) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the explanation.

I rise to take note of the minister's response to these motions, which have been designed to ensure that there is transparency around what the government is actually doing in its expenditure of public funds on housing.

When you look at the main policy thrust here, this is ostensibly about trying to promote the supply of housing, according to the Treasurer. But what's happened on their watch is the greatest collapse in housing construction in recent memory. In 2018, the country built 220,000 houses. This year we'll only get 160,000 houses, which is the same number of houses as were built in Australia in the year 1989. So we are at 1989 housing construction levels under this government. It has been a disaster on housing construction and completions. As a result, I think this is a very reasonable line of inquiry for the Senate to be probing. What on earth is the government doing here?

The government has trumpeted its National Housing Accord. The Housing Accord is reminiscent of the Bob Hawke era accords, where the government worked closely with the unions to run the country—in some cases, to the benefit of the public; in others, to the benefit of the unions. This kind of corporate housing approach, which is an obsession of this government, has been calibrated to ensure that the super funds and other large investors could become perpetual landlords for Australians. It distorts the Australian dream away from being individuals owning houses to being the unions' dream, where the super funds own the houses as perpetual corporate landlords and rent the houses out to Australians, as they are serfs in their mind.

In order to do this, the government has provisioned $350 million to support the Housing Accord with the states but also amongst a group of other parties. According to the Treasury, according to Dr Chalmers's own statements, there are the parties to the accord—the states of New South Wales, Victoria and so on and so forth, and local government associations—but there's also AustralianSuper, Australian Retirement Trust, HESTA, Aware Super, Cbus and so on and so forth, and then BlackRock. So we have BlackRock and the super funds all in on the Housing Accord, all wanting to get their hands on the $350 million in availability payments from Dr Chalmers.

That is why we have advanced these motions to get access to these secret documents. The Treasurer has now filed two public interest immunity claims—and has now been supported by Minister Gallagher here in the Senate—on the basis that the government will not show the Australian public the details of these financial arrangements between the signatories of the accord. So the Housing Accord is a secret. We are not allowed to know how the arrangements are to work between the Commonwealth government and the signatories to the accord, which include BlackRock and Cbus. That is all a secret. So it is already a very murky business, trying to get to the bottom of how Housing Australia operates.

In September this year, the Prime Minister of Australia and the Minister for Housing, Ms O'Neil, announced that the Commonwealth was going to build 13,000 new houses through Housing Australia. As at today—here we are in late November—we still have no idea how that will occur. When we had Housing Australia come to the estimates hearing last week, they said that there were 185 contracts to be signed in relation to those 13,000 houses. How many have been signed so far? One, and 184 are yet to go. They already announced this back in September. This government is big on media announcements and huge on spin but very small when it comes to delivery and getting those shovels out. This is a shameful moment, because the secrecy around this accord where BlackRock and Vanguard and Cbus become perpetual landlords is a disgrace. (Time expired)

Question agreed to.