Jessica Collins (NSW, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to take note of the minister's answer to Senator Bragg's questions on the government's performance on housing. My colleague Senator Bragg asked three questions about housing—questions that he has asked multiple times in the past five sitting weeks—yet we still do not have any answers. You hear from my colleagues time and time again that the accountability and transparency of our government is slipping away every single day. Senator Bragg asked the Minister representing the Prime Minister if 2,000 homes under the Housing Australia Future Fund were built or acquired. Built and acquired are very different concepts. One is a supply side measure. One puts more homes into Australian society for young families to buy. The other is totally and absolutely anticompetitive. We are in direct competition with the Australian people when we are acquiring homes instead of building them. We could get no answer on that from our minister.

Previously, Minister Gallagher confirmed that the Housing Australia Future Fund was acquiring and converting existing homes. Senator Bragg asked for clarification on whether the HAFF, the Housing Australia Future Fund, is still purchasing homes in direct competition with Australians. Instead, we heard from Minister Wong. We heard what they'd like to do—not what they're doing, not what they've done; no numbers on houses that are built for the Australian people. We know that here in Canberra there are only 17 houses—we will also let that figure sink in for a little bit—from the $10 billion Housing Australia Future Fund. It is simply not enough. And yet we don't know if more have been built, because we're not getting the numbers.

Senator Bragg's final question was whether it was reasonable to have asked the minister four times in five weeks how many houses have been built and completed under the $10 billion Housing Australia Future Fund and why we have never been provided an actual figure. It's a very important question to ask. It comes down to accountability and transparency, and we know that those things are under pressure under this government. What we have seen over the past several years is not a plan and not a strategy but a spectacular failure to meet even its own targets—and, worse, a refusal to admit it.

As a new member to this chamber, I have sat here and listened to my colleagues ask very specific questions on how many houses have been built, and yet Senator Wong continues to deflect and speak about projections, none of which are even close to being met. The government promised 1.2 million homes over five years to Australians. It was sold as a bold target to the Australian people, a benchmark that would ease the pressure on Australian families, on young people and on renters right across the nation, and yet here we are with construction rates collapsing to barely 170,000 homes. A year under Labor, this just keeps collapsing, and even the government's own Treasury department doesn't believe in this policy—doesn't believe it's going to work. Instead of fronting up and being honest with the Australian people about this total failure of a policy, it's chosen to tinker at the edges.

Home construction has collapsed and targets are being missed, yet the minister still refuses to admit that the Housing Australia Future Fund is purchasing homes in competition with Australians. (Time expired)