Clare O'Neil (Hotham, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Housing) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Griffith for her question. She's only been here for 3½ months, and she's already a hugely powerful advocate for helping more people in her community get into the dream of homeownership. Housing is a life-defining challenge for millions of people around our country. We hear about it from young people, many of whom feel they will never have the chance to own their own home. We hear it from parents who feel immense guilt that they cannot give their children the stability that they grew up with. We hear it from renters whose rents are going up too high and too often. Since we came to government we've already seen 180,000 Australians get into homeownership with our government's backing, but let's be absolutely clear: first home buyers in this country need and deserve more support, and that is exactly what they're going to get under the Albanese government.

Today the Prime Minister announced that we're expanding our five per cent deposit scheme to be available for the first time to every single first home buyer in our country. We promised we'd do this at the election, and we're delivering three months early. These changes will now roll out from 1 October this year. There'll be no income limits. There'll be no limit on the number places, and we'll have house price caps that actually reflect the cost of the homes where you live. So many Australians that I talk to are in housing distress because they just can't see that pathway to getting into the housing market. This five per cent program expansion will change the lives of tens of thousands of Australians every single year. It's actually not that often that the federal parliament can do something that meaningful that quickly. We saw the proof in the pudding this morning. The PM mentioned that we got the chance to meet, with the member for Canberra, two of her fantastic constituents, Lachie and Abbie.

This is an absolutely gorgeous young couple who have just bought their own home, and they've done it with the backing of our government with a five per cent deposit. Lachie and Abbie talked about this experience they've had of buying their own home. They said they never would have been able to do this without the five per cent deposit scheme. They just described this immense relief that they feel that they can spend their mid- and late 20s paying off their own mortgage, not someone else's. They're fully settled into this beautiful home in Canberra. They've got a gorgeous little dog, Chilli—not as cute as Toto but definitely up there.

Exactly, PM—right here for you. And they told us about how they're hosting these regular movie nights in their own home. It's just these simple pleasures that come with that stability that we've been able to support them with.

That's not all on homeownership. We'll expand this scheme on 1 October. Before the end of the year, Help to Buy will provide the opportunity, eventually, for thousands of people to get into homeownership. We're tackling the housing crisis from every angle, building more homes, making it better to rent and making it easier to buy. On 1 October, our government will open up a realistic pathway for tens of thousands of Aussies, this year, to get into their own home. (Time expired)

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