Kate Mills: September Address
While there is agreement from all quarters that we have a housing and homelessness crisis, agreeing on the problem is not the same as agreeing on the solution. It’s frustrating to see our major parties stymie each other at every turn, rather than work together to come up with solutions. Politics is supposedly the art of the possible, where we get what we can, rather than what we want. The current stalemate between the major parties mean that we aren’t getting very much at all.
Labour has two bills currently with the Senate where it needs the support of either the Coalition or the Greens to get them through, and neither of those two parties are making it easy for them.
*Appendix A: Imagery reflected of a growing political issued shared between AUS and US.
One bill is focused on developing the build-to-rent (BTR) market. It offers tax benefits to foreign BTR operators that come to Australia, with a view to attracting offshore investors into this market. The conditions around it include that any eligible BTR complex must have at least 50 apartments of which at least 10 per cent must have affordable rent which is 25% below market rent. The government expects this to create an extra 150,000 rental homes.
Neither the Coalition and the Greens will not support the bill as is. The Greens see it as more tax benefits for developers and think that the governments should build the apartments and then rent them out at capped rents. The Coalition thinks that it’s a foreign investment policy rather than a housing policy, where Australians will end up living in houses owned by offshore fund mangers. Assistant Housing spokesperson Andrew Bragg referred to Australians becoming “serfs to foreign fund managers”, in a speech earlier this year to the Sydney Institute.
*Appendix B: Imagery from a study predicting a shortage of 106,000 homes in Australia by 2027, made worse by the nation’s housing crisis.
The second bill is a help-to-buy scheme which would give up to 40,000 buyers an equity contribution to their home, meaning that they would be taking on less debt and could get into the housing market with a smaller deposit. The Greens – who have previously proposed a shared equity scheme – say it will drive up housing prices, the Coalition campaigned against it at the election saying that Australians don’t want to co-own their house with the government.
It’s incredibly frustrating that on what is probably the most important issue for people and ultimately for the country, that our politicians are prepared to barter the possibility of more housing for political advantage. Blocking 150,000 BTR apartments because it will be funded by overseas investors is short-sighted. If we want to build 1.2 million dwellings in the next five years – which is the government’s target – then we will need to increase funding and it can’t all come from government. BTR isn’t the solution to the housing crisis, but there is no silver bullet and anything which increases supply of dwellings is a good thing. For someone struggling to get a rental in a major city, the fact that the landlord is overseas won’t make much difference.
Three-year terms make it very difficult to get any serious policy across the line, by the time government have got used to governing, it’s almost time to start campaigning again.
*Appendix C: Imagery from a reflective study by the university of Queensland on growing supply verse demand problem for homeless and non homeless alike.
For rusted-on Coalition voters it probably doesn’t make that much difference, the Coalition has always made it clear that it supports home ownership above all else and its cash grants for first time buyers, or its current proposal to allow people to access super to buy property, do appeal to its supporters. The Greens are playing a more dangerous game, as its decision to block the carbon emission scheme in 2009 has not been forgotten. However, blocking legislation on this critical issue makes both parties look as though they are more interested in politics for their own purposes, rather than in achieving what might be possible for the homeless.
Labour’s policies should of course be scrutinised, but it’s a poor result for all of us if housing policy gets pushed into the too hard basket.
Appendix
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A: Tent Imagery sourced – https://inthesetimes.com/article/affordable-housing-crisis-rising-rent-homebuyers-market
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B: Protest signage imagery sourced – https://www.4bc.com.au/australias-housing-crisis-new-report-reveals-shocking-prediction/
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C: Rental signage imagery sourced – https://stories.uq.edu.au/contact-magazine/2023/australias-housing-crisis-how-did-we-get-here-where-to-now/index.html
