Nick McKim (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

And Senator Scarr says that he has too. What happened back in the day was that, post that royal commission, when the Reserve Bank of Australia was formed, there was a very deliberate decision made to give a democratically elected government, through the Treasurer, the power to override the RBA. That is still enshrined in legislation today. When people say the RBA is independent, they're only telling half the story, and it suits the Labor and Liberal parties to talk about the independence of the RBA because it allows them to wring their hands and say: 'Oh, this is terrible. The RBA is putting interest rates up. It's terrible, but there's nothing we can do about it because the RBA is independent.' The RBA is not independent while section 11 of the Banking Act exists, because that section provides the power for the Treasurer to override the RBA.

Let's be very clear about this. Mortgage holders are facing pain. Former Governor of the Reserve Bank Dr Lowe said in 2021 that interest rates would be on hold for many years into the future. Mortgage holders who believed that and, off the back of that comfort, made a decision to get into the property market are facing massive pressures now after the RBA engaged in an historic, record-breaking series of interest rate rises in this country, where they raised interest rates at 11 consecutive board meetings. Many of those people are actually inside out on their mortgages now—their mortgages are bigger than the value of their properties. That situation is actually on Treasurer Jim Chalmers and the Australian Labor Party, because the power is there in legislation for Mr Chalmers to override the RBA, and he is refusing to do it. What we get is the ashen-faced Treasurer coming out and saying how terrible it is and that he understands the pain faced by mortgage holders but there's nothing he can do about it. Well, there actually is something he could do about it, and that is use the powers that were very wisely inserted into statute to override the RBA. Colleagues, it is fundamental in a democracy that, at the end of the day, the power, responsibility and accountability should rest with those who are directly accountable to the people, and that is us in this place. That is the Treasurer, Mr Chalmers. It is not the unelected technocrats who sit on the board of the RBA.

The RBA as it is currently constituted is a peak body of the neoliberal approach to economics, which is currently cooking the planet and destroying nature to the extent that the ecological processes that actually sustain human life on this planet are collapsing around us as we speak. The neoliberal approach to economics has absolutely turbocharged poverty. It has turbocharged climate collapse. It has turbocharged ecological collapse. And people are paying the price. They are living through floods and they are living through bushfires. So many people in this country—one of the wealthiest countries in the world—are being ground into abject poverty thanks to neoliberalism and economic orthodoxy, supported and delivered by the political duopoly in this chamber, the ALP and the Liberal and National parties.

Well, do you know what? As I said earlier, someone has to stand up for renters in this place. Someone has to stand up for mortgage holders in this place. And it ain't going to be anyone if it's not the Greens. We proudly bring this legislation before the Senate, because the housing market has failed. I remind people that the Minister for Housing, Julie Collins, belled the cat on 7.30 four or five months ago when she said that Labor regards housing as an asset class. That tells you everything you need to know about the failure of the two major parties to deliver for renters and mortgage holders. Both these parties fail to understand one fundamental truth, and that is that houses are places where people make their homes. Having a home is a fundamental human right, and there is no reason whatsoever that every Australian should not have a safe, comfortable, dignified home to live in. The only reason they don't is the choices made by the Labor and Liberal parties in this place, who are mainlining neoliberalism and, in doing so, turbocharging the profits of property speculators and prioritising those profits above the right of every Australian to have a safe and affordable home. It is a disgusting disgrace that not every Australian has a safe and affordable home.

I am so proud to be here with my comrades in the Australian Greens standing up for renters and mortgage holders and saying very clearly and firmly that having a home is a human right and that we fundamentally believe in and have the policies to deliver an Australia where everyone in this country has a safe, comfortable and affordable home.