Jerome Laxale (Bennelong, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Whenever we talk about housing, we need to acknowledge a few things. One is that this is a housing crisis generations in the making. It didn't start in 2022 when the Albanese Labor government was elected. This has been going on for decades because, for decades, we've had poor housing policy by all levels of government and, for decades, this country simply hasn't built enough homes. People in my community and across the country are doing everything right. They're working hard, they're saving but they're still finding it hard to afford to rent a home in many circumstances and even harder to buy a home. The queues in my community for rental properties are staggering. That's not because the Albanese Labor government was elected, and that's not when it started. That's because there haven't been enough homes built in the cities and the regions for decades. Young people feel like they'll never be able to own a home, let alone find an affordable home to rent. Parents tell me that they struggle to give their kids the same stability they had, and that all comes down to housing. That all comes down to successive local, state and federal governments that have not built enough homes.

One of the main reasons I decided to run for federal government was, after a decade in local government, I knew we needed a federal government that took action on housing, didn't just talk about it like those opposite—not like those opposite who didn't have a housing minister for half of the time in their last term of government. I wanted to be part of a federal government that took ownership of this problem and had policies to help deliver on it.

Now, at two elections, we've been elected with policies to attack this challenge that we face, because you can't just keep on turning up to this place and talking about it; we actually have to do things about it, and that's what this government is doing. We've allocated $43 billion to date to deal with this generations-old problem. It's built on three pillars. We want to make it easier to buy a home, we want to make it better to rent a home and we need to build more homes.

Now, if you listen to member for Fadden and the member for McPherson, there's no ownership of their contribution to this crisis. They're just sitting here slinging mud, throwing out acronyms and blaming some report or this other report. There are no solutions in their sprays. For nine long years, they did nothing. They didn't take ownership of the housing crisis, and, in fact, they made it worse. In their nine years, 373 social and affordable homes were built. That's it. Not per year, not per month or week—in the entire nine years, that's all they built. They walked away from the housing challenge.

During the pandemic, when industry experts were saying we should boost our economy by funding the construction of more housing, they came up with a policy to fund renovations for people who already owned homes—ignored experts who were saying, 'Build more social housing during the pandemic; it'll help our economy and it'll help solve the crisis.' They did nothing.

The opposite can be said of this government: real delivery. We've set the really ambitious target of 1.2 million homes. We're delivering 55,000 social and affordable homes through the Housing Australia Future Fund. Those opposite say it's not working, but it is, and I'll give you an example in my electorate. Link Wentworth housing were going to build around 150 apartments. Before the Housing Australia Future Fund, half of that was going to be social homes and half was going to market, because that's the only way they could make it stack up. With the Housing Australia Future Fund—a signed agreement—now it'll be half social homes and half affordable homes. By removing the need to have that private market housing to fund the construction—the HAFF will help them top it up—we'll have more affordable homes in Bennelong because of the Housing Australia Future Fund. There'll be more than 1,000 Build to Rent properties that are currently under planning or construction—just in my electorate, let alone across the rest of the country—all because of policies that those opposite not only voted against but are now complaining are not delivering when they are. Instead of whingeing, we're getting on with the job, and we'll keep on doing it.

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