Andrew Bragg (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Housing and Homelessness) Share this | Hansard source

I don't think the Australian people are silly. I think the Australian people know that there are gimmicks being offered by this government which will never solve this housing crisis. Of course, the only way to solve the housing crisis is to build more homes. The Australian people know that we have a larger population than we have ever had, and the Australian people have noticed that there is a massive collapse in the number of houses. The government, after having promised to spend $60 billion on housing, has delivered more people but fewer houses. That's right—more people than ever but fewer houses.

It's hard to believe that $60 billion could be lost in Labor bureaucracy, but that's the bill that Australians are having to pay. We see the collapse in completions, from an average of 200,000 houses a year, which is what the government inherited, down to 170,000 houses a year now—30,000 houses a year less. Then we have this magnificent flagship, the Housing Australia Future Fund—10 billion bucks, two years of operation and, so far, maybe a handful of houses. We don't know, because it's a very secretive fund. But we do know, because Senator Gallagher told us at Senate estimates, that the fund has bought 340 homes. In fact, the language that Senator Gallagher used was that they had 'acquired and converted' these properties. This is a fund that is literally buying properties that the Australian people themselves could—to use the good senator's words—acquire on their own, so the Australian people are now competing with the government in the market. Having failed to build the houses, they're now buying the houses.

When you look at the contracts that have been signed by this Housing Australia Future Fund, in some cases they are paying up to $1.3 million per dwelling. That is the cost of their new build. The average cost of a new build is about half a million dollars, so why are they paying $1.3 million? Housing Australia is a very inefficient agency. It is spending millions of dollars on consultants, but what it is also doing is funding big investors. It is underwriting the profits of big investors—the big super funds. All the Labor Party's best mates are getting a huge amount of money out of this scheme. The answer to the $1.3 million question is: Labor's mates. They have to pay all these people. All these crooked people have to be paid with taxpayer funds in order to get these properties built. You wouldn't trust the housing fund to build a dunny. So far: two years, 10 billion bucks, a handful of houses, maybe, most of them having been bought—it's been a disaster.

Then we have the five per cent deposit scheme—the gimmick. Having failed on supply, they now want to inflict onto the Australian people a non-means-tested scheme without place caps, and what we've seen in the first month is the biggest increase in entry-level property prices in years. House prices are too high for first home owners in Australia. For the Labor Party to come into this chamber and say they've solved the housing problem—it's all fixed—with the five per cent deposit scheme is insulting. What they are doing is making it harder for first home owners, with their lumbering 95 per cent mortgages. The reality is that these policies of bureaucracy and gimmicks are only making the Australian dream disappear for younger Australians. It has been an absolute disaster so far.