Carol Berry (Whitlam, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The great Australian dream of owning your own home crystallised in the decades after World War II. There was a construction boom following the end of the war, with new suburbs and towns created to cater for returning servicemen and the growing number of migrants—and there was also a baby boom. My grandfather fought in Borneo in the Second World War, and my family were the beneficiaries of this construction boom for returning servicemen, moving into their Housing Commission home in Dundas Valley in the New South Wales western suburbs, where my mother was raised. At this time there were plenty of jobs, and homeownership was not just a dream for many; it was a tangible reality. By 1966, homeownership in Australia hit its peak of 73 per cent.

Homeownership has become increasingly more difficult to achieve over the past 50 years, particularly in recent decades; however, it remains a major goal for many Australians. The Albanese Labor government is helping more Australians realise this dream of homeownership by launching five per cent deposits for all first home buyers early, on 1 October 2025 instead of next year. Under these changes, all first home buyers will have access, with no caps on places and no income limits. We are doing this by expanding the Home Guarantee Scheme.

The Home Guarantee Scheme involves the Albanese government guaranteeing a portion of a first home buyer's home loan so they can purchase with a lower deposit and not pay lenders mortgage insurance. The fact that these first home buyers will not have to pay lenders mortgage insurance should not be underestimated. Lenders mortgage insurance is insurance that a lender takes out to insure itself against the risk of not recovering the outstanding loan balance if a borrower is unable to meet their loan payments and the property is sold for less than the outstanding loan balance. Lenders mortgage insurance is usually required if a borrower does not have a 20 per cent deposit, which is the case for a substantial number of first home buyers. Lenders mortgage insurance protects the lender but the costs are passed on to the borrower and this is usually added on to the loan.

For the average first home buyer, the Albanese Labor government's expanded Home Guarantee Scheme will save tens of thousands of dollars in lenders mortgage insurance. In the first year alone, first home buyers using the scheme are expected to avoid around $1.5 billion in potential mortgage insurance costs. As I mentioned, an important change to the scheme is that all first home buyers will have access to it. There will no longer be any income limits.

Currently, the caps that apply to the first home buyers under this scheme are $125,000 for individuals or a combined $200,000 for joint applicants. Removing these caps will open up the opportunity for homeownership for many more Australians. Furthermore, the property price caps under the scheme will be increased in line with average house prices, therefore providing first home buyers with access to a greater variety of homes.

In capital cities and regional centres in my state of New South Wales, the property price cap will increase from $900,000 to $1.5 million, while in other parts of New South Wales the cap will rise from $750,000 to $800,000. The median home price in Australia today is $844,000 and five per cent of that is $42,000. The last time $42,000 covered the 20 per cent deposit for a median home was in 2002. Just to take us back to 2002, that was the year in which Queen Elizabeth II visited Australia as part of her golden jubilee world tour, Ansett Australia stopped flying after 66 years of operation and Steven Bradbury became a national icon by winning Australia's first gold medal at the Winter Olympics. This was also the year that Kath and Kim premiered on the ABC.

To bring us back to 2025, the Albanese Labor government's expanded Home Guarantee Scheme will mean a first home buyer can purchase a $1 million home with a $50,000 deposit. First home buyers could save up to 10 years on the time it takes to save for a deposit, saving about $42,000 in mortgage insurance, and could pay up to $350,000 towards their own loan instead of paying rent. Importantly, the government has consulted with industry and will direct Housing Australia to promote the diversity of lenders who offer the scheme, giving first home buyers greater choice to buy a home through smaller, customer owned and regional banks.

Since coming to office in 2022, Labor has helped over 180,000 first home buyers get a home of their own with a lower deposit, and the expanded scheme will help hundreds of thousands more Australians. It's important to note that the Home Guarantee Scheme is just one part of the Albanese Labor government's broader, $43 billion housing agenda that is focused on building more homes, getting more Australians into homeownership and getting a better deal for renters.

In its first term, this government began investing $43 billion in housing—eight times more than the coalition invested over a whole decade. It introduced a build-to-rent scheme that will help deliver 80,000 new rentals across the country, giving Australians more rental security. We've worked with states and territories to make renting fairer, with stronger protections for tenants. As a result, most states have now banned no-grounds evictions and put minimum standards in place.

We've delivered a 45 per cent increase in Commonwealth rent assistance, the biggest back-to-back increase in more than 30 years, helping over one million low-income Australian households pay the rent. We've made strong progress in delivering 55,000 social and affordable rental homes for the Australians who need it most. We've invested a record $1.2 billion into building new crisis and transitional accommodation to ensure that at-risk groups—including older women, younger Australians and those fleeing family and domestic violence—will have access to safe and stable housing. We've facilitated the training of more tradies through Labor's fee-free TAFE, and we've provided $10,000 incentive payments for apprentices in construction.

In addition to expanding the Home Guarantee Scheme, the re-elected Albanese government is committed to investing $10 billion to build up to 100,000 homes reserved only for first home buyers, with no competition from property investors. We're implementing our Help to Buy shared-equity scheme, which involves the Commonwealth government pitching in up to 40 per cent of the upfront cost of a home, making it easier for a first home buyer to purchase a home with a smaller mortgage. We're delivering a $54 million targeted investment in advanced manufacturing of prefabricated and modular home construction. We're providing $120 million from the National Productivity Fund to incentivise states to remove red tape and help more homes be built faster, and we're investing $78 million to fast-track the qualification of 6,000 tradies to help build more homes across Australia.

This is a very impressive program of work. The expansion of the Home Guarantee Scheme will help many more Australians believe in the great Australian dream of homeownership, just like my grandparents and parents experienced. For all the reasons I've spoken about, I strongly support the minister's statement relating to five per cent deposits for all first home buyers.

Rebekha Sharkie (Mayo, Centre Alliance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The government has pushed through what are radical changes under the Housing Australia Act through some bizarre, administrative ministerial direction so that we will not properly debate, in this place, this proposal. Instead, we are left with what I feel is an inferior take-note motion. The government is, in my view, circumventing the purpose of this parliament in what is feeling like a rather dictatorial and deeply concerning practice. If the government are so intent that what they want to deliver is good public policy, then they should debate this legislation properly. This legislative instrument builds on the government's initial Help to Buy scheme, where taxpayers are on the hook for the remaining 15 per cent of a deposit to relieve buyers of mortgage insurance.

Mortgage insurance is a lot of money. For many of us in this room, when we were buying our first homes, or perhaps even subsequent homes, we needed to pay mortgage insurance of some amount. It is designed to protect the mortgagor in the case of the mortgagee defaulting on the loan. Twenty per cent is calculated as the maximum expected decline on a property price, and, ultimately, it just safeguards the bank from losing money. Now, taxpayers will pick up the bill and will bear the burden of any loss from defaulted loans. Initially, this program was set for 50,000 homes. Initially, this program was capped, with a focus on assisting working Australians who were earning up to $125,000 as an individual or $200,000 as a couple. Initially, they were modest, 'first-home-buyer house value' caps on what you could purchase. You could say that they also limited the risk for us as taxpayers if a person or family defaulted.

Now, the government's throwing caution to the wind on this. In my nine years in this place, I think that this is the most populist, reckless and inflationary public policy program I have seen, and I've seen a few. It is dangerous. It is going to drive up house prices like never before, and here is why. The scheme is now open to anyone who's a first home buyer, no matter their income. The scheme has been lifted to the most astronomical house prices, and all that's going to do is lift the default house price in each state to set the bar at whatever that threshold is. The government has lifted the cap for properties in all areas. In New South Wales, it's now going to be based at $1.5 million, so there's an increase of $600,000 on the top price that this program applies to. It's really open slather, as I said.

In effect, a couple could get mortgage for $1.2 million, put down a five per cent deposit of $75,000 and the taxpayer is on the hook for $225,000. What could possibly go wrong? They only need to get sick or not be able to earn for a short period and, very quickly, those mortgage payments and that family's life or that individual's life would fall apart. At a rate of six per cent, monthly payments on a $1.2 million loan over 40 years are approximately $7,193 a month, with total interest paid of roughly $2.25 million. Who really pays when it falls apart? It's going to be the taxpayer. As taxpayers, people right across the nation with homes of much lesser value are going to be picking up the pieces.

The kicker is that this is not going to make homes more affordable at all. All it will do is set the new base house price at the top level of this scheme for each state, because the demand for this scheme will be so high that it's going to artificially inflate house prices. Part of the reason why the demand will be so high is that we've had record net migration in this nation. Over one million people have moved here just in this government's last term, and they're all going to be wanting to partake in this proposal. I understand that. It's simple economics that this program, coupled with record migration, is going to add to the demand side of this equation. It's like pouring kerosene on an already lit bonfire. Inflation is real. There were further inflation figures out yesterday which should cause everyone concern. They were higher than expected.

In South Australia, the cap has been lifted from a house price of $600,000 to $900,000. This will just make the base price $900,000 for an entry level home in South Australia, because the artificial demand will create that as the default price. The minister said:

Right now, we need to lean in and help those first home buyers get their foothold in the market.

Quite frankly, I'm not sure what the 'lean in' vernacular means, but I can tell you what the outcome will be. It will be inflationary. It will not lower house prices, and it will catch young people and first home buyers desperately wanting to own their own home into a trap, and they will not be able to get out of it.

There is a name for loans that are given to people who can't afford them. They're called subprime mortgages, and they caused the global financial crisis back in 2007-08. I remember it very well. This is government sanctioned taxpayer-supported subprime lending. Many people have short memories, but, back in 2007-08 in the financial crisis, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loans collapsed under the weight of risky mortgage backed securities that they acquired and guaranteed fuelling a housing bubble in the US, in particular. When that burst, it sent shockwaves right across the world. Whole neighbourhoods collapsed. Whole neighbourhoods were boarded up with homes unsellable. Who is giving the government this economic advice? Surely the Reserve Bank wouldn't have supported this proposal?

As I've said before, we have taken away the Australian dream in just one generation, and I feel for young people. My three children are all desperately saving. One just got their block poured for a very modest home. It's their first dream home. But they saved for years and had second jobs to make it work. It's quite clear how we have done this. We've done it by inflating demand and through record migration. I have looked at the data of migration levels since Federation. Whenever we have exponentially lifted migration, we've caused inflation. It's just the way it is. It's a simple demand-supply proposal. It's Economics 101. I'm not sure if it's to create growth in the economy, but all it has done is price our kids out of homeownership.

For rental properties, increased temporary migration and student visas have contributed to unbelievable rental increases. Back in 1990-91, Australia offered just over 35,000 student visas. In 2022-23, we offered 577,000 student visas. Last year, we offered 371,000, and the government has announced they're going to increase that by a further 25,000. The majority of student visas transition to permanent visas, and we've created an expectation that will occur. If the government meaningfully and tangibly wants to help Australians into a home, the most responsible and efficient way to do this is to reduce migration because you're then managing the demand side, and that's the area we haven't tackled. We haven't tackled the demand side for a decade.

So we're simply not building enough quality homes, and I would say that most of us don't want to continue the constant carve-up of farmland on the edge of suburbia, putting more pressure on the environment, to expand our suburbs in order for everyone to own a home. As I said, we need to tackle that demand side. I've got to say, it's just heartbreaking to watch in my community 200- and 300-year-old gum trees getting felled and those areas turning into 250 square metre blocks. That's the thing with the houses at these ridiculous prices we're selling to our children—there's no backyard. Then we wonder why children are obese. There's nowhere for the kids to play but the street.

If you go back to the mid-90s when housing was affordable—when I bought my first home as a single woman—migration in 1994 was 46,000 people a year. Then it went up to 100,000. Then, under Rudd, it exploded under his 'big Australia' policy, and that is where the problem is. As I said, we've had a combined influx in just two years of a million permanent migrants, and we don't want to talk about it in this place, but that is creating a demand that we can't control. Then you have the government come in here with irresponsible policies like this as a way to try and address that housing demand. I predict interest rates will not fall with this program in place. What the government has put forward here is a dangerous, populist thought bubble that will have real-world consequences for all of us.

Peter Khalil (Wills, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak not just on this but for an entire generation of Australians who have been locked out of the housing market because of the policies, or, should I say, the lack of policies of previous governments. This generation of young Australians have been locked out not because they lacked ambition but because the system itself has put homeownership increasingly out of their reach. For too long, young people in this country have felt let down by not having any opportunity to purchase their own home.

We, on this side of the House, are very cognisant of the challenges they've faced. That's why, since we came to government, we have been making the ability and the opportunity for young people to get into the housing market a priority of this government. That's why, in backing up that cognisance of understanding the challenge, we have made record investments in housing in this country. We've actually backed it up with record investments. From 1 October this year, even more young Australians will be able to realise their dream of homeownership. And that's thanks to this government, the Albanese government, bringing forward our Home Guarantee Scheme to allow first home buyers to buy a home with just a five per cent deposit. You heard it right; it's just a five per cent deposit. We're bringing down all first home deposits from 20 per cent to five per cent this year, from 1 October, because affordable and secure housing should be a human right in this country. It's about dignity.

I know it is valid as well that housing in Australia has also been a vehicle for investment and so on, and that's fine. But having a roof over your head, having your own home, is really about basic human dignity. It is the foundation, literally the physical foundation, to be able to then fulfil your potential in the workforce and through the social, economic and the educational opportunities that flow from that foundation. But first and foremost—it's Maslow, if you're familiar with that, Deputy Speaker Chesters—it's to get that shelter in place. It is about human dignity. I think that housing needs to be seen in this frame—the importance of it for every single Australian and their future ability to fulfil their potential.

In the first year alone, first home buyers who will be using this scheme that we are debating here are expected to avoid around $1.5 billion in potential mortgage insurance costs. That's a massive amount that will be avoided. And we're not going to stop there. We won't stop there, despite whatever arguments are made by the other side for political pointscoring, because we'll continue the family home guarantee that helps single parents to buy a home with a two per cent deposit—not two per cent but five per cent. That is amazing.

Since coming to office in 2022, the Labor government has helped over 180,000 first home buyers get a home of their own with a lower deposit. That's 180,000 families. That's a lot of people that have been given the opportunity to build that foundation and to have that foundation to fulfil their potential in life. On average, there have been more than 6,000 more first-home-buyer loans a year under Labor compared to under the coalition's period in office. That's 6,000 more than under the other mob.

Now, the median home price in Australia today is $844,000, and five per cent of that is around $42,200. The last time $42,200 covered the 20 per cent deposit for a median home was in 2002, which shows the generational scale of this change. This is in stark contrast to the housing policies—if I can call them that—brought to this year's election campaign by the coalition. Their solution to the housing crisis? Let first home buyers access up to $50,000 of their own super to buy a home. I'm not sure what they were thinking—what kind of fantasy this was. Not only was this policy completely irresponsible but no-one across from us had the foresight to think how this would inadvertently bring up housing prices.

So, unlike that horrid election commitment that was made by the coalition, we are putting forward real, tangible relief for millions of Australians in this country in this bill, this scheme and all the others that I've spoken about. We were re-elected with a clear mandate to bring down the deposit hurdle for first home buyers, and we are delivering on that.

In my electorate of Wills, 38 per cent of my constituents are renters. The expanded scheme means a first home buyer in Wills could purchase a $600,000 home with only a $30,000 deposit. They could save up to six years off the time it takes to save for a deposit, save about $25,000 in mortgage insurance—that is a very important element—and pay up to around $126,000 towards their own loan instead of paying rent. That'll make a difference to the future of all of those people. Since the inception of our Home Guarantee Scheme, 1,010 people in Wills, in my electorate, have accessed it.

As I said, affordable housing is critical as the foundation for people wanting to fulfil their potential. I grew up in inner-city Melbourne in public housing—I'm a houso—in the seventies and eighties. We grew up in a housing commission, as it's called in Victoria. I share that with the Prime Minister, who, if you don't know, also grew up in social housing.

Honourable Member:

An honourable member interjecting—

Peter Khalil (Wills, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes, everyone knows. They might not know that about me, though. For my family, a migrant family that came to Australia in the seventies, having access to that affordable housing helped to level the playing field to a certain extent. It offered my family real equality of opportunity, and it was because of the policies of Labor governments, both state and federal, that we were given that opportunity. Despite many of the challenges and the prejudices we faced, it gave me the chance to succeed based on hard work and on merit. The fact that we had that foundation meant we weren't worried about being able to have a place to live. We were given that opportunity. The five per cent deposit scheme brought forward by the government will now make it even easier for those growing up in situations like mine to purchase their first home and have that foundation as well.

As I said, we were elected with a clear mandate to bring down the deposit hurdle for first home buyers. That's what we're doing today with this debate. We have an ambitious $43 billion housing agenda that is actually delivering on our promise and our election commitments, because this government is about delivery. When you get rid of all the white noise—all the sound and fury that comes from the opposition benches, the crossbench and all the rest of it—in the end, Australians look to their government, the federal government, to fulfil its commitments and to deliver on the commitments it makes to them. We are building more homes to deliver on our commitment. We're backing first homebuyers, and we're supporting renters as well.

We're making the Australian dream of homeownership attainable for millions of Australians, as it should be, because I think it's true to say—and I would hope this is agreed upon right across this place—that every Australian deserves the opportunity to own their own home. It shouldn't just be some day in the distant future; it should be sooner. And this government, the Albanese Labor government, is working hard every day to deliver and make that dream a reality.

Leon Rebello (McPherson, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak not just about housing policy but about the very foundation of the Australian story—the dream of homeownership. For generations it has been the great leveller—the proof that through effort, sacrifice and determination, any Australian, no matter their start, can own a small part in this country and call it home. That dream's now slipping away. Under Labor it's not just delayed; it's being dismantled.

When the coalition created the Home Guarantee Scheme, it was targeted, it was careful and it was compassionate. It was designed for those hardworking Australians who could service a mortgage but who struggled to save the deposit. It was a helping hand, not a handout. Labor's taken the policy that once empowered Australians and turned it into something totally different. What was once a hand up has now become a handbrake. This new version does nothing to increase supply. Even Treasury admits that Labor's changes will drive up prices. Former RBA economist Martin Eftimoski warned that this policy is like 'pouring gasoline on a fire'.

Young Australians already struggling will now be forced to chase homes that sprint further out of reach. And who carries the risk? It is not the government but the taxpayer. A $60 billion liability sits on the shoulders of ordinary Australians and future generations. This is not policy for those who need it; it's politics dressed up as compassion—bigger loans, greater defaults and taxpayers footing the bill. And what about the broader picture? Labor has spent more on housing than any government before it—$43 billion—and yet Australians are worse off. Under the coalition, close to 200,000 homes a year were being built. Under Labor, that's dropped to barely 170,000. At the very same time, they've presided over the largest population boom since the 1950s. More people, fewer homes—that is Labor's legacy.

Homelessness is now at its worst in living memory. Services report surging demand, especially among women and girls. Very recently I had the opportunity in my electorate to visit a place in Burleigh and meet with Rosies, who do fantastic work in our community providing food and speaking to people who are homeless and who are struggling—those people who are seeing the brunt of this housing crisis. Labor's much heralded promise of 1.2 million new homes by 2029—what happened to that? Their own Treasury officials say it will not be met.

Labor claims to cut red tape, but the truth is they multiply it—5,000 new regulations, 400 new laws and nearly 3,000 pages of construction codes. They smother builders and developers in paperwork, and then we all wonder why fewer homes are being built. Australia's become addicted to bureaucracy. We now have 35 per cent more laws than Canada, a country nearly twice our size. What's being suggested is not reform; it's regulatory quicksand. It kills ambition before it even begins.

Labor's flagship, the Housing Australia Future Fund, is one of the greatest public policy failures of our time. It has $10 billion taxpayer dollars tied up in a fund, yet no-one can tell us how many homes it has actually built. At one moment, the minister says 2,000 homes. At another, the Minister for Finance admits zero. At Senate estimates, we discover that Labor are not even building homes; they're buying them. They're competing with Australians at auctions, driving up prices. It's a policy so absurd you could not script it.

Perhaps most concerning is where Labor's housing dream truly lies. It's not with families; it's with big super funds—often those that are tied up with or owned by the CFMEU. Labor wants Australians to rent homes owned by unions, not own homes themselves. They've gone to extraordinary lengths to hide correspondence showing super funds lobbying to weaken transparency rules. When questioned, the Treasurer blocked the Senate from seeing the truth. What will happen if big super dominates the housing market? What will happen? Rents will rise, choice will fall and ordinary Australians will find themselves tenants in a country where they once could have been owners.

And that takes us to the CFMEU, a union dripping in corruption, now expanding into residential housing. Independent estimates say their involvement inflates construction costs by 30 per cent. That is a tax on every new apartment, every new build and every young Australian's dream. The coalition's put forward a bill to keep taxpayer money out of the CFMEU's hands, but Labor won't support it. Why? It is because, to them, ideology trumps integrity.

This is where the coalition is different. We don't just oppose Labor's values; we offer a vision. In my maiden speech in this place, I spoke about the great nation-building task of starting to think about creating new cities. Australia has always grown by thinking big, but in recent decades we have stopped dreaming. We have stopped building. Instead, we cram more people into the same few cities, driving prices up, infrastructure down and the quality of life lower. We must think differently. We must build anew with new cities planned from the ground up, with housing, transport, industry and services integrated from day one. They would be cities that relieve pressure on Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane while creating new centres of opportunity. This is the same vision that built the Gold Coast, that built Canberra and that transformed Western Sydney. I refer to a fantastic article by Simon Kuestenmacher that was in the Australian on 21 August: 'One Gold Coast is not enough, Australia needs more new cities just like it'. I quote from this article:

The only problem that I see with the Gold Coast is that we only built one. We should look at the Gold Coast as a model for the future of Australia. I want to see six or seven more Gold Coasts by the end of the century.

At the end of World War II Australia was home to seven million people. A decade later Australia added two million residents on the back of the baby boom and Mediterranean migrants. Where did Australians live? Mostly in the same five big cities we live in today: Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth.

Since WWII we have grown the country by 20 million residents and the Gold Coast remains the only new sizable city we added to the mix. The rest of the growth was squeezed into the same cities we occupied in 1945.

If we want to keep the dream of homeownership alive, we cannot simply tinker at the edges. We must be bold enough to imagine and to build, because the answer to a housing shortage is not simply going to be solved by increasing demand. It's by addressing supply.

Housing is not just an economic issue. It's a cultural one. It's about aspiration, independence and belief in one's own effort. We believe in supply, not spin; in cutting red tape, not adding to it; in supporting the vulnerable, older Australians, women fleeing domestic violence, indigenous Australians and our youth not through empty promises but through policies that can actually deliver real outcomes and, in this case, make housing more affordable. Above all, we believe in keeping the Australian dream—the dream of homeownership—alive.

Labor's failures on housing are not just statistics. They are shattered aspirations. They are young Australians who are priced out of their first home. They are families unable to find a rental. They are the homeless sleeping rough in a country that should do better. The people of McPherson have not sent me here to accept this decline but to stand against it. The coalition will fight for a future where effort is rewarded, where supply meets demand and where Australians—not unions, not super funds and not the government—own their homes. Housing is more than shelter. It's the foundation of family, the foundation of community and the foundation of independence, and it must never be surrendered.

Joanne Ryan (Lalor, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It's pleasing to hear that those opposite understand that supply is critical to the issue of housing, and it's a generation-made problem that we're facing today. It's interesting to hear that they understand that supply is key to that. Yet they spent the second half of our first term in government blocking supply and blocking measures from Labor that would have driven supply. It is fascinating.

We're all here today to talk about the five per cent deposits that this government have created for new homeowners and have brought forward, to 1 October, changes where the caps will better suit each state or city, and to talk about how things work. It's also to celebrate, in my case, the 1,880 participant households that have already used this system and the 3,140 individuals who are reflected in those households. That is the secret to adding to supply. This is about saying to a generation of Australians who feel left behind on housing that we want them to have a home of their own, with the security that brings, and to support young Australians do just that.

I might take a moment, Deputy Speaker Chesters, to talk about what this means for single parents. We'll be continuing the Family Home Guarantee that helps them buy a home with a two per cent deposit. This is extraordinarily important in a community like mine. We'll be delivering this three months early, from 1 October. This crisis wasn't created overnight and it won't be fixed overnight, but real progress is being made, right across the country, as is seen in the electorate I represent.

In the first term, we took the Commonwealth from being a negligent bystander under the coalition to being a bold and ambitious government under Labor—more bold and ambitious since the Second World War. But let's be clear: the job isn't done. It's still too hard to build and too hard to buy in this country. This announcement is about allowing all first home buyers to buy their own home with just a five per cent deposit or the Family Home Guarantee, where a single parent could secure their mortgage with a two per cent deposit. Of course, as has been referenced, this is also about people not having to have that insurance that could cost over $30,000 on, say, an $800,000 home. This means people will get out of their rental into the situation where they're in their own home, so they can stop paying rent and start paying their mortgage. It means less time to save for that deposit. So rather than saving over many years for a 20 per cent deposit, it might take only two years to save for a five per cent deposit, depending on what you're earning and in which part of our great country you're living.

If we look at my community, where the median house price is $600,000, we're talking about a five per cent deposit being quite attainable for the young people that I represent—not just those I represent but those who come and join us in our affordable housing area, in the city of Wyndham, from outside of Wyndham. They will also be able to come and buy one of the new homes that go up every week in the area I represent. On the way, they can save about $30,000 in mortgage insurance and they could pay up to a quarter of a million dollars towards their own loan, rather than paying rent across that savings period.

It's important to note that we are bringing this good news to the parliament after decades of neglect in the space of addressing housing or the Commonwealth being a partner to the community in housing, and after having both the Liberal-National coalition and the Greens block our work, in this space, across the last few years. They didn't support our 100K homes for first home buyers, they voted against Help to Buy and promised to abolish the scheme before the last election. They've given up on homeownership. This government is just getting started. Now they're attempting to raise taxes on builders and scrap 80,000 new rentals in the process.

In a community like mine, the people who manage to get the five per cent deposit and get into the market will be forever grateful. They will remember that moment when they secured that home loan, just like most of us across the country do. I distinctly remember securing the home loan and buying my first property with my husband at the time. It was a great moment. It meant that we could stop renting. It meant that we were going to be moving into something and start paying that mortgage down. It was a fantastic moment. Of course, properties then were more accessible in terms of our incomes and what the property prices were. This is something that is going to support young people that I represent and support young people across the country to become homeowners who pay off the capital as well as the interest, making sure that they join the ranks of people who own their own home. We've already seen that on the ground in electorates across the country. The number of young people who have already taken up this opportunity is actually really impressive.

I look forward to seeing more and more—particularly, if I think about it, the two per cent deposit for single parents. I think this is an incredibly important part of this legislation and one that not many people are paying a lot of attention to, but, as someone who, as a single parent with three children, was paying off a mortgage and working part time, this would have been a game changer for me. I'll go back and share that situation with the House. When I became a single parent, I was talking to someone at the credit union that held my mortgage about the changed circumstances and how I was quite sure that I was capable of meeting those mortgage payments on my own. The manager stepped out, having heard me in this conversation, and said: 'Can you come in? I just want to have a quick chat?' He said to me, 'Let's just pay it for 12 months, and then we'll look at it,' because the instinct of a bank is to tell a single parent that they can't afford to do this. I'm proof they can afford to do it. A two per cent deposit will allow people to get into the space where they're given that opportunity to put a roof over their head and the heads of their children in a home that they own and that they can't be removed from because someone wants to sell the property.

The two per cent deposit for single-parent families is absolutely a critical part of this process. It will see single parents in my community, whether they be mums or dads, get a roof over their head and the heads of their children, through a government that's prepared to back them, help them and assist them by creating a space where they can do that with a two per cent deposit. That is something that I think will be achievable for a lot of the people in that circumstance in my community.

Elizabeth Watson-Brown (Ryan, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The government is finally taking action on housing. If you're a property investor, hurrah! This policy is for you. You can celebrate this. House prices are going to increase even further. You heard me right. Labor's First Home Guarantee, which allows first home buyers to buy property with a five per cent deposit, is another purported solution that's just going to make the housing crisis worse.

In Brisbane, including in my electorate of Ryan, house prices have doubled in the last 10 years. Nationally, home values and home prices have already increased by three per cent since the start of 2025, and respected analysts are saying that this policy could lead to a more than 15 per cent increase in house prices over the next six years. Experts have advised—they've actually told the government—that this policy will just drive up prices further. The Australian public have told the government that they want real action on housing that actually helps them, and who's the government actually listening to? Big property—the property industry and property investors, who will receive this largesse to the tune of $175 billion in tax handouts over the next 10 years through negative gearing and capital gains discounts.

What do mortgage holders and renters actually get? Zero. A big fat zero—absolutely nothing. Labor effectively continues gifting money to big investors with dozens or hundreds of properties in their portfolios, turbocharging house prices and pretty much screwing over everyone else in the process.

The Commonwealth Bank just posted a $10 billion yearly profit off the back of soaring house prices. The Commonwealth Bank used to be ours. It used to be publicly owned, by us, until it was sold off by Labor in the nineties. It's now a massive, private corporation focused on profit for its shareholders. That's what it is. It's certainly not focused on the greater good, is it? It's certainly not part of a solution for access to housing for everyday Australians.

The other big banks aren't far off CommBank's big profit figure. They're going to be absolutely ecstatic at this government's latest fix for the housing crisis allowing a five per cent deposit with no mortgage insurance. Why? It's because it allows them—this is why they'll be happy—to extract even bigger interest payments out of even more first home buyers while still turbocharging house prices further, and further, and further up, putting housing out of reach for so many millions of Australians. The risk for the banks is minimal, because they know if they issue too many dodgy loans and things go south, the government has their back and will bail them out with taxpayer money—your money.

It's a great scheme, if you're the Labor Party trying to look like you're doing something about the housing crisis while keeping your donors—the banks and the property industry—happy. The best way to actually fix the housing crisis—if that's what we're actually here for and if that's what we're trying to do—would be to scrap negative gearing and the capital gains tax discount and invest those enormous sums of money in actually building public housing.

Well, the government has finally decided to build some public housing—no, not for ordinary Australians, silly. It's building housing for US military personnel. That's right! The first piece of housing legislation for this term of parliament isn't for the government to build public housing that ordinary Australians can live in, and it isn't for winding back unfair tax concessions so that first home buyers don't get outcompeted by property investors. It's to allow the government to spend an unspecified amount of money—totally obfuscated—building housing for the US military on Australian soil as part of the AUKUS agreement. I really wish I was making this up, but—I'm sorry—it's true. For years, the Greens have been trying to get the government to actually build public housing, like governments used to—like governments actually should. But we're told that that's unrealistic; it's not a serious demand. It turns out you can live in public housing built by the federal government—you just need to sign up to the US military to do that.

If you're a teacher or a nurse working hard but you can't afford a house or find a rental, this government is simply not servicing your needs in terms of your access to housing. Doesn't it care about you? It's made its priority clear—serving the US military-industrial complex over the needs of ordinary Australians, who are so desperate for access to housing.

The recent productivity roundtable agreed that productivity reform in the housing industry is urgently needed. It's absolutely essential for Australians; it's essential for the economy. Trophy homes and megamansions are what we're actually building in Australia instead of public housing. The capital gains discount encourages homeowners to build ever-larger, ever more expensive houses and apartments. A significant portion, a huge amount, of the Australian building industry is tied up with these elaborate, top-of-the-market construction projects: trophy homes, luxury apartments and monster renos. They tie up a huge proportion of our most creative builders, skilled tradespeople and expensive materials in Australia.

As an architect, I've actually witnessed firsthand the devastating reduction of productivity in the housing sector since 1995. This decline matches exactly the period in which Australia's homes have increased in size to exploit the tax-free capital gains discounts. From 1994 to 2024, newly built detached houses increased in size by 30 per cent, while household size decreased by seven per cent. Abolishing capital gains discounts makes it much less attractive for wealthy investors to put their money in inert property, where it just drives up property prices, making it harder and harder for first home buyers entering the market. Incentivising good builders to move from large, complex and slow home building to compact, simple and affordable construction would dramatically improve the number of new homes being built. The abolition of capital gains tax discounts would have a real, a tangible, effect on the cost of housing.

There are real solutions to the housing crisis—solutions that could be implemented today. But what the government is proposing is no solution. I would argue that it's the opposite of that. What the government is doing is actively exacerbating the problem.

Matt Smith (Leichhardt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to take note of the ministerial statement made in the House on the Albanese Labor government's policy of a five per cent deposit for all first home buyers. As the minister said in her statement, Australia is in the middle of a housing crisis 40 years in the making. Over 40 years, governments of all stripes have not invested enough in housing. That is not political posturing; that is fact. If past governments had been investing enough in housing we wouldn't be in the position that we are in right now. We should not be in this situation. People are being left without the opportunity to get into their homes, and this five per cent guarantee allows people to get into their own homes sooner. This has been the result of the Anthony Albanese government paying attention, listening and responding to what the community needs and deserves.

Right now in Cairns there are 490 modular homes being built for social and community housing. This is to help relieve the pressures in Cairns. Those 490 homes address 0.5 per cent of the entire housing population. Over the next 18 months, over 500 homes will be built in Leichhardt and the Far North. This will include infrastructure being placed in rural and remote communities to ease the overcrowding pressures we find in some of those communities.

This is a forward-thinking bill. It creates solutions to problems that have been decades in the making. With a five per cent deposit people don't have to wait 10 years to save up for a deposit for their first home. They can do it much, much sooner. Combined with the 20 per cent HECS debt reduction, people are getting excited about the prospect of owning their own little piece of Australia, about getting into the housing market and raising a family in a backyard the way their parents did, the way they grew up, the way that the Australian dream has always been positioned.

We're also making it easier to rent. There's the new rent-to-buy scheme, which will help other people get into their homes. The government can put in 40 per cent of the total value of a home, and you pay it off over time. When it's done, it is yours—your piece of the Australian dream. This is a great example of what happens when government finds solutions to problems and doesn't just sit there on its hands and blame other forces. It's taking the responsibility for a problem that was not ours in the making but is certainly ours to solve.

The Anthony Albanese Labor government understood, listened and responded, and it was a big part of what we took to the election. It was about increasing supply, making sure that there are more houses for people all over the country. We have banned foreign residents from buying homes for two years to increase that supply. We've invested billions in trunk infrastructure and modular housing to get these homes built faster. Modular housing can make construction time up to 50 per cent faster, getting people into their homes at a much quicker rate.

My parents owned their own home. They paid it off when I was 16 years old. It was one of their proudest moments. My children, through initiatives such as this, will also own their own home. They'll be able to purchase it in their 20s like my folks did, pay it off in their 40s like my folks did, and live the rest of their lives mortgage free. That is the ambition for our children. That is the ambition of this government: to recreate the opportunity for homeownership and open it back up to everybody, not just the privileged few who can get a bit of help from the bank of mum or dad or get those great big jobs. Everybody has the right to own a home, and this bill is about precisely that.

But what did we see from those opposite for the previous 10 years? Not even a housing minister. There was no-one to champion homeownership, no-one to help those who were doing it tough and who wanted to buy in the way their parents did, the way they saw their grandparents do, where they grew up in backyard that was theirs, with a pet or the ability to put up a swing set or put holes in the wall, as happens when you've got rambunctious children. This bill gives people that ambition. It gives them that dream.

As Darryl Kerrigan told us in The Castle, 'It's not a house; it's a home.' We're giving people homes. People love their homes. It's where all of the memories are made. The 490 homes being built in Cairns right now for social and public housing will create a community. Grandparents will meet their grandchildren there for the first time. Christmases will be held there. Memories will be made, love will be shared and a community will be developed on what was once an empty drive-in site where the last film shown was Pretty Woman. This is a much better use of that space. It is close to schools and close to amenities. It is a well-thought-out and well-delivered actionable part of these policies. It is going to make the lives of the people in my electorate better. I commend this bill to the House.

Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Small Business) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is such a privilege to be able to get up and speak to this motion, because homeownership is central to the vision we should want for our nation. When I think about the enduring strength of our country, all the way to its modern foundation, one of the key pillars that led to our foundation was the idea of the democratic ownership of our country. It has endured in comparison to European settlement, where many people came from the United Kingdom and they inherited a hereditary system of governance and land title and ownership based on privilege, based on your blood line. One of the great promises of this great country was that we were not going to be a nation where you were going to have your life determined based on who your parents or grandparents, all the way back through generations, were. The promise of this great nation, the promise of Australia, was that we were going to be a nation where, through hard work, sacrifice and effort, you could own a share of it for yourself and your family as the foundation of your security and your future success.

That continues to be the promise of this great nation today. The importance of homeownership is the greatest manifestation and reflection of it, as well as the family unit. That's the basis that I stand for, fight for and will continue to fight for into the future—homeownership. It is the very embodiment of the Liberal ideal. The Liberal vision of this country is that families will come together and own a chunk of this nation not just as the foundation of their security but that will become the wellspring of their future economic success, their security to be able to go on and contribute to the rest of their community and then to become part of the pillars and the foundation of the success of our nation. That's why homeownership matters so much. It's why it has always been one of the great cleaving points of our national political debate.

At the end of the Second World War, when soldiers were coming back, the Labor Party faced a great big choice. The question was: how do we build the homes for returned soldiers who have sacrificed so much in defence of our country? The solution the Labor Party wanted at the time was to build homes so that returned soldiers could forever rent off the Australian government. The socialist vision has always been one of dependence. The socialist vision and the Labor vision has always been one where they control the people of this country.

The Liberal vision, by comparison, was always one where we wanted a nation of homeowners. We wanted to build the homes of the nation so that returned soldiers and their families and the future generations of this country would go on to own their own homes. That was the clear choice then, and that remains the clear choice now. That's why, when the Prime Minister and the members of this government get up and speak about the virtues of what they claim they're doing in homeownership or in housing, they are so often explicitly focused on how they can control the population—how they can build housing so that they can control how you live your life. This is why, on this side of the parliament, we do not believe in so much of what they're trying to achieve in housing policy.

We don't believe that housing policy should be a mechanism to control the Australian people. We believe that housing policy should be focused on how to empower the Australian people. At the centre of the Labor Party's agenda, there has always been a mechanism to control the Australian people. First, it's Labor wanting people to be dependent on welfare so that they can then control the recipients. Then it's superannuation through industry super funds so that their unions can control your retirement and your destiny. Or it's through the mechanisms of work so that they can control how much you're paid, when you're paid and how you work. They want to control you. But, more than anything else, Labor wants to create a nation of renters controlled by superannuation funds under their control so that the renters will always be dependent on housing stock that Labor directly own through the government or that they own through superannuation funds—so that they can control you.

The Liberal vision is completely different. We fundamentally believe in empowering Australians. We want young Australians to be able to get a good education so they have the best chance they can have to go on and get a good career. We want to keep their taxes low so they can then be in the best position to save and get ahead so they can form a family and go on and buy their own home. We believe in homeownership because we believe it is the foundation of future economic success and security. From that, one day they will be in a position to be able to do things like form a small business and be independent and empowered all the way through to their retirement. They will be in a position to choose their own destiny. There is a clear choice between the Labor vision of control and the Liberal vision of empowerment. This is why it is so important we stand in this parliament, despite the protestations of the Labor government—they always want to find a new mechanism and a new lever to control the Australian people. That's why, no matter how many people they have in this parliament, we will never surrender and we will never back down, because at the heart of the Liberal vision is the success of the Australian people.

This is one of the big dividing lines of Australian politics. People in school groups and everywhere else across this country ask, 'What is the difference between the political parties these days?' The differences are manifest, but, more than anything else, the Australian Labor Party celebrates the success of this country through Labor's success. The Liberal Party celebrates the success of Australia through the success of the Australian people, and that is the difference. Our success is lived through 26 million people, every day, waking up and living out the success in their own lives. We do not want to decide your future. We do not want to decide your destiny. We want you to have choices about how you live your life and to be fully empowered to make choices about your family and your future. That is the key difference. When Australians are going about living their best lives and living how they see fit, they are living and breathing, every single day, the full manifestation of the Liberal vision of this country.

That is why the housing debate is so important. It is the catalysing moment in so many Australians' lives about how they can have prosperity, security and, of course, the opportunity of living out their best Liberal life. This is an important debate because we absolutely want homeownership to be central to the foundations of this country. We don't want the Labor vision of control for this country. We don't want young Australians living a life of dependence and thinking that the only way they can get ahead is through either their blood line or their proximity to power. That is a central part of the control mechanism that the Labor Party has always wanted. They love a system where it's based on proximity to power and whether you pay your tithe to the union—and, of course, whether that union is then in a position to tax their take along the way—because, when they do that, they set up a cartel arrangement where they're able to get the maximum benefit for themselves and those closest to positions of power. We utterly reject that proposition because it is not a system that is focused on empowering the Australian people. It has only one vision, then, when you achieve that.

That vision, the Labor vision, is to feed those people closest to positions of central power and make them first in line at the trough. That is the problem with the Labor vision for this country. It is about themselves and their own success at the expense of the Australian people. The only objective of the Labor vision is how to fill the trough up for themselves as fast as possible, sacrificing the future and the opportunities of the Australian people along the way. They don't care whether you own your own home in the process, because your house is their political weapon for their ends.

We will stand here and fight every step of the way for the Australian people to empower the Australian people—whatever it takes. So long as there is breath in my body, the vision and the dream of homeownership in Australia must be fought for because it goes to the heart of who we are. It goes to the heart of our vision for the country. It goes to the heart of what we want for the future and the ambition of this great nation.

Alice Jordan-Baird (Gorton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to take note of the minister's statement on the five per cent deposits for all first home buyers brought forward by the Minister for Housing. Australia is in the middle of a housing crisis 40 years in the making. For 40 years, our country has not been building enough homes, and we've not been backing our first home buyers right across the country. This issue couldn't be more relevant than in my electorate of Gorton.

Stretching from Mount Cottrell in the south-west all the way to Keilor in the northern corner, Gorton is one of the youngest and fastest-growing electorates in the country. In Gorton, housing is about making sure that everyone has a roof over their heads, but, more than that, it also represents my electorate's hopes for the future. The median age in Gorton is 35 years old, one of the youngest in the country, and we have more than 40,000 residents between the ages of 25 and 39. This is the time in a person's life when settling down and starting a family is front of mind, and yet many in my electorate are still wondering whether they might ever be able to afford a home of their own.

Throughout the election campaign, I met thousands of young people and felt their anxieties about the future. Many of these young people were not where they thought they'd be. They were still renting or living with their parents. I spoke to a group of young people in their early 20s from a share house in Fraser Rise. Situated between Caroline Springs and Melton, Fraser Rise is a new suburb populated by young families and young people. It's part of the western growth corridor, made up of many new housing developments. The young people in this share house were studying, commuting to the Victoria University Sunshine TAFE and working a number of jobs. They told me that they felt homeownership was out of reach, and they couldn't think of a world where renting wasn't their only option.

These young people are not alone in their anxieties about the future. Housing is a life-defining challenge for millions of Australians today. Too many young Australians are being locked out of the housing market. Too many young Australians feel that they have no choice but to confront a future without a stable place to call home. That's why, from 1 October 2025, first home buyers will only need a five per cent deposit to buy a house—a five per cent deposit for every first home buyer, with no income limits, limits on places or house price caps.

Young people aren't an afterthought here. On this side of the House, we know that young people are the bread and butter of our country, our democracy and our future. This policy is for us. More on that, we're delivering this election commitment even earlier than we said we'd deliver it. We're delivering it three months earlier, from 1 October, because, on this side of the House, we understand the urgency of this issue. We understand that when we talk about the housing crisis, we're not just talking about housing, not just about a roof over your head. We're talking about a young person's future—what their future will look like, what challenges they will face. We're talking about a sense of certainty and stability. We're talking about an injustice in the challenges experienced between generations. We're talking about how invested Australians feel in their democracy, because when your future is uncertain, when it feels unjust, your sense of trust is eroded.

The five per cent deposit for first home buyers will cut years off the time it takes to save for a deposit. It will save thousands in lender's mortgage insurance and rental payments. It will help more people into their first homes sooner, gaining confidence in their future, closing the gap between generations. Under this program, a first home buyer could take up to eight years off the time it takes to save for a deposit on the median $844,000 home. Along the way, they could save about $34,000 in mortgage insurance and could pay up to a quarter of a million towards their loan—all of this, rather than paying rent, because young Australians should be paying off their own mortgages, not those of their landlords. Young Australians deserve financial stability.

This is what real cost-of-living relief looks like, and it's real cost-of-living relief for those out west. Since Labor came to government in May 2022, more than 1,800 people in Gorton have been able to buy their first home with a five per cent deposit or less, thanks to Labor's expanded Home Guarantee Scheme. That's delivering for young Australians, but we know that this five per cent deposit is far from a silver bullet, and that's why we're tackling the housing crisis at every single angle.

We're building more homes. In Labor's last term of government, we built 500,000 homes. We have 28,000 social and affordable homes, paid for by our government, currently in planning and construction. This term, we're working towards a bold, national aspiration for Australia to build 1.2 million homes in five years. Thanks to Labor's crackdown on the housing crisis, housing approvals are up 30 per cent and construction costs have stabilised. We're supporting our skilled construction workforce with more than 400 construction trade apprentices in Gorton benefiting from $5,000 incentive payments, helping to build the workforce Australia needs.

From 1 July 2025, Labor's Key Apprenticeship Program is offering up to $10,000 in incentive payments to apprentices commencing their careers in housing construction. This is huge, given the number of houses we need to build. I'm proud to represent a community made up of tradies, with many construction tradies living in my electorate. I'm excited that this program will incentivise so many of them to stay in the construction industry, where we need them most.

On this side of the House, we're committed to building more homes and helping Australians get into their own homes, but we know there are renters who need support now. That's why we're delivering rent relief for those doing it tough. We've delivered back-to-back increases to the maximum rates of Commonwealth rent assistance—an increase of 45 per cent since we came to government. Commonwealth rent assistance has been received by more than 7,900 people in Gorton. This means more money in the bank for 7,900 household budgets in my electorate, taking pressure off the myriad financial pressures Australians feel today.

I'm not just proud that Labor is in this House tackling the housing crisis head-on, easing cost-of-living pressures for young Australians; I'm relieved. We know that those opposite think that young people raiding our superannuation for a house deposit is the way to go. They believe we should sacrifice what we've set aside for retirement, even though this will only force housing prices up and make it even harder for young people to get into the market. The coalition voted against Help to Buy and promised to abolish the scheme. They didn't support the build for 100,000 homes for first home buyers, and now they're attempting to raise taxes on builders and scrap 80,000 new rentals in the process.

Unlike the coalition, we have not given up on closing the generational gap of homeownership. We on this side of the House want people to own their own homes and get into the housing market as early as possible. We have young people on this side of the House, and we care about young people on this side of the House. On this side of the House, we're getting on with dealing with our housing crisis. We're not interested in blocking or delaying this reform. We're giving Australians—Australians like those young people in Fraser Rise, who felt like owning a home was an unrealistic expectation—a real chance at homeownership, something that felt unachievable before.

I am proud to be part of an Albanese Labor government who are building more homes and making it better to rent and easier to buy, because young people don't deserve to be locked out of the housing market. They deserve certainty in their future. They deserve access to a home.

Debate adjourned.