Jacinta Nampijinpa Price (NT, Country Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Defence Industry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Defence Housing Australia Amendment Bill 2025. At the outset, let me say that the coalition supports the government's bill. We neither seek to refer this bill to a committee nor seek to delay its passing. This bill amends the Defence Housing Australia Act 1987. Under the current act, Defence Housing Australia can provide housing and housing related services to the following: to members of our Defence Force, to departmental staff, to defence contractors and to the families of the aforementioned. This bill expands the categories of persons who can be provided housing and housing related services by Defence Housing Australia to the following: to members of a foreign military, to officials of a foreign country, to contractors engaged by a foreign military or government, to representatives of Australian charities and to the families of the aforementioned.

In more immediate and practical terms, this bill facilitates the accommodation of nuclear powered submarine crews from the United States and United Kingdom on our soil. These crews will operate out of Western Australia's HMAS Stirling on a rotational basis from 2027. Indeed, a small cohort of advancing personnel from the United States will arrive in this quarter, whom we look forward to warmly welcoming.

This bill underpins AUKUS. This bill operationalises AUKUS. This bill strengthens AUKUS. That's why the coalition endorses this bill. With their long-range strike, deterrence and stealth capabilities, nuclear powered submarines are among the most valued assets in the arsenals of our key allies. In the years ahead, they will be one of Australia's most valued assets too.

The secrets of nuclear powered submarines must be closely guarded. This bill will result in a greater presence of foreign individuals on our soil with access to defence facilities. Most of these people will be officials or service men and women of our allies and thus imminently trustworthy. However, when it comes to contractors of foreign countries and charity workers, there are, of course, additional risks. The Director-General of Security said the following during the 26th Annual Hawke Lecture:

Australia's defence sector is a top intelligence collection priority for foreign governments seeking to blunt our operational edge, gain insights into our operational readiness and tactics, and better understand our allies' capabilities.

Targets include maritime and aviation-related military capabilities, but also innovations with both commercial and military applications.

And with AUKUS, we are not just defending our sovereign capability. We are also defending critical capability shared by and with our partners.

Mr Burgess's remarks are a call for greater vigilance. Under this bill, more people will be able to access our defence facilities, and with more access comes more risk.

Accordingly, in endorsing this bill, the coalition puts on the record the following expectation: the government undertake rigorous security checks on all who will be working on or stationed close to our defence facilities. Such screenings are necessary to protect our assets and our secrets, as well as those of our allies. Indeed, were the capabilities of our allies to be compromised on our soil, the fallout would be an erosion of trust of such magnitude that AUKUS itself could be put in jeopardy.

As anticipated, the Greens have proposed an amendment to this bill that would omit the new categories eligible for Defence housing. The Greens want to torpedo this bill, because, well, they want to sink AUKUS. That comes as no surprise to any of us. On this important piece of defence legislation, this chamber has again been given a window into aspects of the modern Greens party—first, their strategic ignorance; and second, their animosity towards our allies, fuelled by their anti-Westernism. The coalition resoundingly rejects the Greens proposed amendment.

This is my first time speaking on a Defence bill in this chamber in my capacity as a shadow minister in the Defence portfolio. In the context of discussing this bill, it's important to make a few points to inform our national debate on defence. Many Australians hear about important defence developments. They hear about AUKUS. They hear about Australia acquiring nuclear powered submarines from the United States and frigates from Japan. They hear about Exercise Talisman Sabre, where our Defence Force trained alongside those 18 other nations. But Australians don't hear often enough why these things matter. Why are alliances important? Why is acquiring cutting-edge defence weapons important? Why is exercising with partners important? Put simply, strength matters—the strength of our alliances, the strength of our capabilities, the strength of our preparedness. Strength helps maintain peace in our region—a peace that has been the motor of human progress. Strength helps deter aggression. Strength helps us to defend our home and to protect our sovereign interests. Make no mistake; strength is paramount to deal with a great danger of our age. And that's the danger posed by the Communist Party of China.

Since the second decade of this century, the Chinese Communist Party has been defined by key features—its military build-up at speed and scale, not for self-defence but to exert power; its willingness to flex its military muscles to intimidate; and its disrespect for the sovereignty of other nations. The Chinese Communist Party has militarised islands in the South China Sea. Its coastguard has harassed the Philippines. Its air force has intruded into Japan's airspace. Its navy has tested weapons off the east coast of Australia without notifying us. We cannot ignore the rehearsal nature of that exercise or the fact that its missiles can strike Australian bases and civilian infrastructure. Its forces have also endangered our servicemen and servicewomen through reckless and aggressive manoeuvres on multiple occasions.

One of President Xi's goals, in his words, is to 'reunify' China and Taiwan. He has not ruled out using force if necessary, and he has instructed his forces to be ready to invade Taiwan by 2027. Defence specialists, foreign affairs experts and China analysts have repeatedly sounded the alarm not only about the Chinese Communist Party's revisionist agenda but about its desire to dominate the region. If you don't believe the specialists, the experts or the analysts, then President Xi's own words make clear his ambitions.

There's a litany of examples of the Chinese Communist Party causing tensions across our region, but, with his six-day visit to China, Prime Minister Albanese would have Australians believe there's nothing to see here. Moreover, by drawing a false equivalence between the Chinese navy's live-fire exercise in the Tasman Sea and our own navy's activities in the South China Sea, our prime minister did the unthinkable. He condoned behaviours of the Chinese Communist Party that should have been vociferously and publicly condemned. Under this government, there has been a noticeable reluctance to call out the Chinese Communist Party's hostility. If a is threat disregarded, downplayed or left undiscussed by the government, two things happen. First, Australians are unlikely to appreciate the threat. Second, they're unlikely to understand the need for policy responses or, indeed, support them. That's why I will regularly and directly call out the hostile activities of the Chinese Communist Party.

The more Australians understand the dangers posed by the Chinese Communist Party, the more they will appreciate our nation's urgent need to bolster Defence. Predictably, our opponents will accuse us of beating the drums of war or playing politics or fearmongering. But it's not fearmongering to point out irrefutable facts. The government's resort to such smears has become a convenient excuse—an excuse for the Albanese government to not put money where their mouth is when it comes to Defence. Defence spending under Labor remains woefully inadequate at around two per cent of GDP. Projects have been cancelled or deferred to pay for the nuclear powered submarines. Critical capabilities from the government's own Defence strategic review are now not funded at all or are underfunded.

As for the bill before us, it expands Defence Housing Australia's responsibilities, but it comes without any new investment for housing. The shadow defence minister aptly said in the other place:

This government continues to legislate ambition without resourcing it.

The shadow defence minister was also right in his observation:

This bill will be the first operational test of AUKUS on Australian soil.

Indeed, there is a correlation between Australia's ability to house our allies and the success of AUKUS. I fear this government is in denial. They're in denial about the threats to regional stability. They're in denial about what we must do to deter aggression and defend our nation. They're in denial about the urgent need to lift defence spending.

Diplomacy is important, of course, but this government has the naive view that authoritarian regimes will behave like democracies. The Minister for Defence often bemoans that China's massive military build-up has occurred without transparency or strategic reassurance. The truth is, as history teaches us, the best deterrence of aggression is strength: the strength of our alliances, the strength of our capabilities and the strength of our preparedness. It's beyond time for the Albanese government to get serious about strengthening defence, and that necessary resolve is reflected in the second reading amendment circulated in my name.

Our sovereignty is not undermined by alliances; rather, strong alliances underpin our sovereignty. With almost 300 days having passed since the US election, our prime minister must make the effort to meet President Trump. He must put his personal qualms about the President to one side, just as past presidents and prime ministers have done. He must act in our national interest and re-energise the alliance. If this government truly believes in a free, open and stable Indo-Pacific, then it must quickly come to realise which major power stands for those goals and which power wants to shatter those goals.

The coalition have committed to lifting defence spending to three per cent of GDP, and we urge the government to do the same. That's the bare minimum of what's required to deliver the capabilities we need.

In recent weeks the government made one of its few fine decisions on defence. It selected Japan's Mitsubishi Heavy Industries to build the Royal Australian Navy's future fleet of 11 general-purpose frigates. The coalition welcomes this announcement, but this decision should not detract from the urgent need to strengthen our sovereign industrial base. We need to be manufacturing our own missiles in their thousands to deter and to defend. We need to build swarms of drones and counterdrone technologies. We need to be churning out autonomous underwater vehicles. We need to be hardening our military bases, especially in the north. We need to ensure more than 7,000 people enlist in the ADF each year, especially when there are 75,000 applicants. But we can't do any of these things if there's insufficient money behind them. And we can't adequately house our allies if there's no new money behind this bill.

I say it again: it's beyond time for the Albanese government to get serious about strengthening defence. Moving from rhetoric to readiness requires resources. I commend this bill, and I move the second reading amendment circulated in my name:

At the end of the motion, add ", but the Senate notes:

(a) that the strategic environment facing Australia is the most challenging since the Second World War, requiring increased investment in national defence capability;

(b) that the credibility of the AUKUS partnership depends on Australia's ability to deliver housing and infrastructure for allied personnel in a timely and secure manner;

(c) that the Bill expands Defence Housing Australia's responsibilities without any additional funding or a supply-side housing strategy to support defence families or allied personnel;

(d) the importance of strengthening Australia's alliances with the United States and the United Kingdon through delivery—not just declarations; and

(e) the urgent need for the Government to commit to increasing defence expenditure to at least 3 per cent of GDP, and to deliver the enabling capabilities required to protect Australia's prosperity, security, and way of life".

Raff Ciccone (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It's good to see you, Deputy President, and it's good to see everyone back here for the upcoming fortnight. I rise today to speak in support of the Defence Housing Australia Amendment Bill 2025, which is currently before this place. The overarching purpose of the bill will allow Defence Housing Australia to provide housing and support services not just for Australian personnel but also for our United States and United Kingdom partners as part of the AUKUS alliance. In fact, the changes will allow DHA to provide housing to foreign military and civilian personnel and their families for the first time.

AUKUS is a cornerstone of the government's national security policy, aimed at protecting our nation's interests and our security. For this reason, the bill that is before us today is an important part of our long-term defence strategy, ensuring that we're ready to meet our obligations under AUKUS and to support our partners here on Australian soil. As chair of the Senate Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Legislation Committee, I've seen the work that has gone into ensuring that the bill, as well as AUKUS more broadly, balances our national strategic interests with the needs of local communities.

These amendments that are before us are especially timely as we prepare for the establishment of the Submarine Rotational Force - West from as early as 2027, which will see nuclear powered submarines from the US and the UK operating on a rotational basis out of HMAS Stirling, in Western Australia. The US and UK personnel will also be working alongside our ADF men and women, so it is imperative that we support them properly. Utilising DHA will also ensure that the housing meets Defence standards, housing solutions are cost effective and overseas personnel aren't competing with the local housing market, which is an important point that I want to make here today. If these changes aren't adopted, then we risk delays in supporting AUKUS personnel, and that could affect the delivery times of this trilateral partnership.

It's also important to note that this model will support local builders and investors, with work already underway to identify new housing developments. DHA has signed agreements in Rockingham with four Western Australian companies, through the New Builds Volume Leasing Program, to support the delivery of new properties. Suppliers will also offer investors the opportunity to purchase properties off the plan which will be leased to DHA once construction is complete. This model helps keep DHA's upfront costs low, guarantees rent for investors and supports the local construction industry.

As we know, building a skilled trilateral workforce is critical to delivering Australia's future—our future, which means our conventionally armed nuclear-powered submarine capability through AUKUS. While our nuclear-powered submarine program under Pillar I of AUKUS has received much attention in the media, it is Pillar II which I'm quite excited about and which is equally transformative. This pillar focuses on cutting-edge areas such as cyber capabilities, artificial intelligence, quantum technologies and undersea systems. By collaborating in these advanced domains, Australia gains access to next-generation technologies, strengthens and builds the resilience of our defence forces and enhances our ability to respond to emerging threats across the Indo-Pacific. This means faster development and deployment of advanced systems, stronger defence networks and greater strategic self-reliance for Australia in what is an increasingly complex security environment.

On the jobs front, AUKUS will create around 20,000 direct jobs around our nation—and not just in shipbuilding hubs in the states of WA and South Australia. The benefits will also flow through the full supply chain—even in my home state of Victoria and right across the country, including in our regions—strengthening Australia's industrial base from the ground up, which is something that has been missing since the closure of the auto industry.

As we look ahead, AUKUS represents the single biggest investment in the history of Australia's defence capability, bringing record investment in defence, skills, jobs and infrastructure. This bill is about more than just housing; it is about making sure that Australia is ready to take full advantage of the historic and transformative opportunity that exists. It reflects the government's commitment to AUKUS and our confidence in Australian industry and DHA to deliver the infrastructure that is so desperately needed to support the success of the AUKUS partnership. I commend this bill to the Senate.

David Shoebridge (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise on behalf of the Greens to oppose the Defence Housing Australia Amendment Bill, which is—at least it was honestly referenced by the government—directly intended to spend the Australian public's money to build public houses for US troops under AUKUS. It is utterly astounding that this is the first public housing bill that's been brought forward by the Albanese government in now—what is it?—three and a bit years of government. The only express public housing bill that they've brought forward in three and a bit years is to build public housing for US troops under AUKUS. You could not make this stuff up.

The Greens sought to refer this bill to an inquiry because we thought the Australian public might have an interest in whether or not it is a sensible use of Australian public money to spend heaven knows how much on building houses not for Australians who can't afford them—for people who can't afford to pay the rent, people living in tents or caravans or people who are in crowded or insecure accommodation—but instead for US troops under AUKUS. This won't surprise you, but the war parties, the Labor Party and the coalition, opposed an inquiry into this bill—no doubt because they have at least some vague sense of the sentiment of the country, which would be to overwhelmingly reject this.

The real nub of why this bill is being presented now is that the Albanese government is rushing headlong with the Scott Morrison plan to build the United States a nuclear submarine base just off Perth. The Albanese government has committed $1.7 billion of public money to build the US their nuclear submarine base off Perth—and they want to have that up and running by 2027—so that the United States can save some money and time by sending their submarines on a shorter route into the Strait of Malacca and into the South China Sea to continue the US's warmaking plans against China. That's what the Albanese government is committed to, and they want this base up and running by 2027. They pretend that it's going to be there for Australian nuclear powered submarines and that's why we have to have it running by 2027. On no-one's plan will Australia have a nuclear submarine by 2027. It is so obviously designed to deliver a US nuclear submarine base—and just a US nuclear submarine base.

If you look at the data and the materials coming from, for example, the individual who's just about to be the chief of the US Navy, and if you look at report after report from the Congressional Research Service or the public evidence about the US shipbuilding capacity, Australia will not be getting nuclear submarines in the mid-2030s. Most of the Australian public is already convinced of this. We know we're not going to be getting nuclear powered submarines, but we're still shovelling billions of dollars into the US—tribute payments to Donald Trump. We know that the UK nuclear submarine project is in complete meltdown; their own audit office says that. If we're not going to get nuclear submarines and there's no realistic pathway for us to get nuclear submarines, why are we spending $1.7 billion of taxpayers' money to build a nuclear submarine attack base off Perth? The obvious answer is that that's all a charade for us to be building yet another US base in Australia.

Even US defence hawks point out that, once that base is up and running, it will be a high-priority target in any conflict between the US and any other peer power. It will be a high-priority target. We are literally putting a nuclear target on Perth. Australian taxpayers are paying the $1.7 billion to put that target on Perth not for our own nuclear submarines but to be providing, effectively, an advance base for the US and their nuclear powered submarines.

If that wasn't obscene enough—far from making Australia safe, that whole project is designed to make Australia a target and to enmesh us in the next US war so that we have no choice but to take part in it—now we have the Albanese government saying, 'Not only do we want to make a geopolitical mistake and put a nuclear target on Perth but we want to build public houses for US defence personnel to help deliver that as well.' The estimates are that about 700 homes will be built. 'How much will that cost?' you ask. 'How much are we going to spend to build housing for US troops in Perth?' That's a fair question. One of the reasons we wanted a Senate inquiry into this bill was to ask the obvious questions: How much will it cost, and where is the money coming from? Is the Albanese government going to take it out of the NDIS budget? Are they going to take it out of other housing initiatives? Where is the money coming from, and how much will it cost?

There are no answers from the government on this—no answers at all. In fact, there's some blithe statement somewhere in the government's papers stating that they don't have a cost for this bill. They haven't put forward a cost. They haven't gone to Treasury and asked how much it will cost. It is utterly reckless for the Senate to be passing a bill to build heaven knows how many homes for US troops without understanding how much it will cost or where the money will come from. But the war parties, the coalition and Labor, are so keen to avoid scrutiny on this bill that the coalition are helping Labor rush it through, even though there's no dollar amount attached to it and no source for the funds. That's what happens when you have a lack of rigour and scrutiny around such a major project as AUKUS. You get dangerous rubbish like this being rushed through the Senate without proper inquiry.

The Greens have a second reading amendment, which I foreshadow. This amendment points out that there is no costing attached to this bill. We don't know where the money is coming from. We don't know if it's going to come from stopping families who have kids with autism from being able to get care for their kids. We don't know if it's going to be coming from stopping mums in Townsville who are living in insecure accommodation from getting access to basic shelter. We don't know where the money is coming from. But I'll tell you what: at the end of the day, that is where the money is coming from—from other essential public services that the country needs. Instead of getting those essential public services, the Albanese Labor government have decided they want to build homes for US troops under AUKUS. It is obscene.

When you look at the bill, it's not just US troops that the Albanese government wants to build homes for. The Albanese government also wants to build homes for international weapons companies' contractors. They want to be able to build homes for the employees of Lockheed Martin. They want to be able to build homes for the employees of Boeing. They want to be able to build homes for the employees of Elbit Systems and Rafael, Israeli weapons manufacturers. They want to be able to build homes for pretty much anybody in the war industry, while they're resisting the repeated calls the Greens have made to build homes for Australians who desperately need them.

And then we get this specious, farcical argument from Labor that AUKUS is apparently all about jobs. We have Labor come forward and say, 'Oh, I love this AUKUS thing, this $385 billion war-making plan for nuclear submarines, because it's all about jobs.' They spout this number of 20,000 jobs, right? There's no modelling to show that. There's no evidence that they present that links to 20,000 jobs. They just make the number up and keep asserting it. I challenge Labor to show us the modelling and the data that it produces 20,000 jobs. But, even if that were true, if you're getting 20,000 jobs for $385 billion, the public is spending almost $20 million a pop for every job.

There is no other program in the history of the Australian nation that sees $20 million per job. It is the single worst argument for AUKUS because what we know from all of the modelling about the armaments industry and about the war industry is that, far from generating economic returns, putting money into weapons and killing, sending it to Donald Trump and giving it to Rolls Royce takes money out of our productive economy, takes money from jobs and takes money from critical services, where it can generate economic and social good and lead to a stronger economy and a better society. It takes away from that. You would be better off employing 20,000 people to dig a hole somewhere and fill it in again. You'd get better economic and social returns for that than you would from spending $385 billion on nuclear powered submarines, houses for US troops and a tribute payment to Donald Trump. There would be a better social return for that.

You see moments in this place where the coalition stand up and say, 'Oh, you know, we have small, marginal criticisms about Labor. We're going to complain about how much they spend on defence, but we're going to just push this through without scrutiny—don't you worry about that,' and where Labor steps up and starts misdirecting and saying, 'This is all about jobs. Don't you look here. Nothing to see here.' There is something to see. Whenever these two war parties come together to hide the truth, you know they're doing it for the wrong reasons. In this case, they're rushing this bill through because we know what it's about. It's about indicating to Washington and Donald Trump that Labor and the coalition have always got the US military's back, that they'll always build them houses when they need them, that they'll always shovel billions of dollars of Australian taxpayers' money to US weapon systems and that they'll build them a submarine base off Perth. They don't care if it's going to put a target on Perth, and they don't care where the money comes from.

The war parties take their directions from Washington, and that's what this bill is all about. You may as well have the US Secretary of Defense running this thing, because that's who will benefit from this. It won't be Australians. To hear the coalition come in here and say, 'This is about making Australia safe'—in what world does building a US nuclear submarine base off Perth, housing for US military personnel, housing for a weapons contractor's employees and putting a target on Perth make us safe? In the coalition's mind—and it's shared by Labor—their view for Australia is to just become one big US military base. That's why the war parties, Labor and the coalition, have agreed to station nuclear-capable B-52 bombers at Tindal and to extend RAAF Tindal to put US nuclear-capable bombers there, and they won't tell the public whether there are nuclear bombers there.

That's why Labor and the coalition joined together to expand the footprint of Pine Gap, which we know is sending targeted data to the Israeli military and to the US military and their unlawful strikes on Iran and most likely helping identify kill targets in Gaza. That's why Labor and the coalition are keen to expand North West Cape, another US military base designed to communicate with US submerged submarines. If ever the message comes from Washington to press the doomsday button, to fire off multiple ballistic missiles and destroy life as we know it on this planet, it will come through the North West Cape in Australia, aided by the Albanese government and the coalition. The message will go through the North West Cape. It's critical for the US. That's where the doomsday message will go. And far from shutting it down, Labor and the coalition are expanding it, wanting it to be a principal US space communications base. With this, we have Labor spending $1.7 billion plus, plus, plus to build the US a nuclear powered attack base off Perth. It's not in Australia's interest.

Australia has enormous geopolitical and geostrategic benefits where we are. We don't need to be a part of these US wars. We live in one of the most secure parts of the planet. The coalition and Labor want to run scare campaigns to say that we will be invaded by the Chinese Communist Party and attacked by some nefarious global attack against Australia. We live in one of the most secure parts of the planet, secure from these geopolitical conflicts that the US wants to get us involved in, and, far from using our geography to protect ourselves, the coalition and Labor are inviting us into the next US war. They're making us a US base, a target, and enmeshing our military into the United States military so that we will inevitably be involved in someone else's war, just like they got us involved in someone else's war in Afghanistan, just like they got us involved in someone else's war in Iraq, just like they got us involved in someone else's war in Vietnam. That's what they do. They deliver not for the Australian public; they deliver for Washington. That's what this bill does. Houses for US troops, not houses for Australians who need them. We oppose this bill, and it is extraordinary that the Greens is the only party in this place that will be opposing this bill.

Matt O'Sullivan (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

():  I rise to speak on the Defence Housing Australia Amendment Bill 2025 and, at the outset, declare that the coalition will be supporting this bill. This is important. It's important that it goes through this place and receives royal assent so that we can get on with the job of providing housing for US and British submariners and their families when they arrive. Interestingly, the primary allocation of these homes will be in my home state of Western Australia.

This is an enormous opportunity for Australia. Australia is in desperate need for AUKUS to proceed, for it to occur with great urgency—to happen as quickly as possible, but thoroughly as well. There is going to be a huge opportunity right across Australia, but in particular in my home state of Western Australia. It's the part of the world where I actually live, which is not too far away from Garden Island, HMAS Stirling base, and that whole area around Henderson where the ships are going to be built. It's an important project, an important development in my part of the world, and it's something that we need to see happen.

Unfortunately, though, with this bill there is no allocation of funding, as Senator Shoebridge was saying. That's going to put significant pressure upon the housing market that exists right now. Homes are already scarce in Western Australia. My brother and sister-in-law listed their home for sale only a few days ago, and, literally within two days, the home sold well above their expectations in terms of pricing. It sold very, very quickly. Homes are extremely rare and hard to get a hold of. There is no allocation of resources in this bill for the development of new homes, and that is the central point that I want to make in my contribution here today—that the government is not doing what it needs to do to step up to the plate to provide for the homes and the housing that will go along with this legislation.

Put simply, all that's going to happen—while I very much support the ability for Defence Housing Australia to be able to provide homes to people that are coming in with their families from overseas to be a part of the AUKUS program—unfortunately there are no new homes that are being developed and built. That is going to put enormous pressure upon an already pressured environment.

I was talking to the Salvation Army in that part of the world, down in Rockingham. They have many clients, many people that they're working with, that are simply living in their cars and sleeping rough. I was told of a family that have the ability, the financial means, to be able to spend up to $600 a week on rent, but they cannot find a place to live in that part of the world or indeed further afield, and they're living in their car—a family with children. This is unacceptable. The concern I've got is that this is just going to add to an already pressured housing situation.

What the government needs to do is step up. I also call upon the state government, the Cook government, to do what it needs to do to make sure that there is fast-tracking of land development and that there is fast-tracking of opportunities for developers to be able to develop homes, for subdivisions to be able to take place and for housing to be able to get in there.

We've got skill shortages. There are so many issues that compounding this problem. By simply making it possible for Defence Housing to make these homes available, the problem is—they would be a good tenant if you are a landlord of course. If you have a big line-up of people to get a home, who are you going to give it to? Of course, you would be giving it to an institution like Defence Housing. What does that mean? That means we're not going to have enough homes out there for people in the general market to be able to take up. So the government needs to step up and do more than simply what is in this bill. While this is welcome, more needs to be done to make sure that the defence housing is available for people coming in from the United States and the UK.

The coalition is enthusiastic. We are very committed to AUKUS. We recognise that this is absolutely vital to our national security, it is vital to our future and existence as a nation and it's something that we need to see continue to be supported. We are absolutely enthusiastic about it. Unfortunately, though, I'm not seeing as much of the required rigour and commitment by both the state and the federal governments when it comes to AUKUS. There are serious limitations in relation to the needs that are required within that area. As I've said, I live in that part of the world, and there are infrastructure needs that are necessary to support the huge development that's going on in that part of the world. We estimate that there's over $70 billion worth of investment into the south-west corridor of Perth, including new hospitals that the state government are building. But all of that compounds to create one massive problem: the need for greater investment in infrastructure in the whole south-west corridor of Perth. It's vital.

For example, there is the road in and off Garden Island. The causeway comes from the island and lands on the mainland on almost a goat track, when you consider it. If you go down there, you'll see that it's a poorly designed and poorly maintained road. It hits a bottleneck in the morning. You've got traffic congested up hill and down dale, and it's a significant issue. An easement was established, under the Stephenson scheme, for a major road to be able to go through—called the Garden Island highway. It was land that was designated decades ago, but there's been no investment in making sure that that road is able to go ahead. With the huge increase in traffic that will come with the construction of projects over on Garden Island and, indeed, the workforce that will be coming and going—there'll be single men's quarters on the island, but the majority of people are going to be staying in homes that this bill is designed to support, and they will essentially be on the mainland. Traffic needs to be able to come and go, and there's not the infrastructure that's required to support that. And, again, there's no plan to do it. This will happen in 2027—and 2027 is just around the corner. If you want a home built by 2027 or if you want a road completed by 2027, guess when you need to start? You need to start right now. You can't just turn it on overnight; you need to have the pipeline. We're not seeing the planning, we're not seeing the investment and we're not seeing what is required to fully enable the opportunities.

There are huge gaps when it comes to skills. We've got young people that could take up wonderful lifelong, generational careers. The children of the young people who could take up these skilled jobs would be able to flourish—and for generations to come—but there's no investment in the skills that are required. There's fee-free TAFE, but none of it is designed to make an allocation for the jobs that actually exist within the AUKUS program. This is a great shame, because there are enormous opportunities that could be enlivened through the shipbuilding and the maintenance and all of the opportunities that are coming with AUKUS, yet there's no strategy. An announcement gets made about a whole bunch of funding and an announcement gets made about the partnerships and relationships with the United States and the UK, but then there's nothing that hits the road in terms of investment or planning. This is a significant issue.

I'm not the only one that is saying this. The former US Navy secretary Richard Spencer said this to the Nightly earlier this month:

I'm sure in their hearts there's a plan, but you know what? That should be started yesterday.

He went on to say:

We need to start moving dirt, putting the infrastructure in, because 2027 is going to be here within the blink of an eye and 2030 will follow very quickly.

It's high time that we got serious about AUKUS. It is absolutely vital to Australia's future, security and prosperity. The opportunities that are there for Western Australians in particular and for people in the south-western corridor of Perth are significant and important, and we're not seeing the government do what it needs to do to ensure that that investment is there. We must play our part. We've got to build the houses and the infrastructure required.

Our allies have given us a golden opportunity, and we must seize it. This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity, but we've got to seize it. We've got to put in place the planning, make the decisions, cut through the red tape and drag the councils in. The councils, frankly, are the ones that are in many ways leading the way; we're seeing delays with the state government and delays here with the federal government, not fronting up with the investment that's required. It's not good enough. Our defence capability is at stake and the opportunities that come with it are at stake if we don't act with real determination. This is important for the future of our nation, and it's important, indeed, for Western Australia, so I commend this bill to the Senate.

Ellie Whiteaker (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I, too, rise to speak on the Defence Housing Australia Amendment Bill 2025, a really important and practical piece of legislation. The Defence Housing Authority was established in 1987, under the Hawke Labor government, to ensure that members of the Australian Defence Force and their families had access to quality, affordable housing no matter where they were posted, as Prime Minister Bob Hawke said at that time. That is an outstanding example of our government's fundamental approach—an integrated, comprehensive, consistent and coherent approach, with all sections of industry, all departments and all levels of government making the maximum contribution to our national goals. Today we continue that legacy by providing housing to support our personnel, our partners and the broader network of supporting organisations for our Defence Force. Housing has always been one of the most important conditions of service. A safe, secure, affordable home directly affects the wellbeing of defence personnel and their families, which, in turn, impacts retention, morale and operational readiness.

This bill updates the functions of Defence Housing Australia so that it can better meet the modern needs of our Defence Force and support our national defence interest. It expands the functions of Defence Housing Australia to provide housing for additional classes of persons. This includes our AUKUS partners, civilian contractors and charities that support the work of Defence.

This bill is really important to support the work that is required for AUKUS, which, as Senator O'Sullivan has just spoken to, is so important for my neck of the woods: the southern suburbs of Western Australia. AUKUS is crucial to our nation's security interests but also to the economic future of the southern suburbs of Perth, Henderson, HMAS Stirling and the surrounding area.

Over the next few decades, the Henderson strip will see billions of dollars in investment from the state government and the federal government to support our nation's future security interests. It will support the build of our own conventionally armed nuclear powered subs to replace the Collins class fleet. It will require thousands—more than 3,000, in fact—of skilled workers at HMAS Stirling alone. It's an investment in our future defence industries. It's an investment in developing the supply chain. This will be one of our greatest industrial endeavours in Australia's history, and Australian jobs and Australian industry are at the heart of this investment. It will grow more robust and more resilient supply chains, will strengthen our Defence Force and is crucial to the interests of our nation.

We will see as part of the AUKUS partnership an increasing number of foreign military personnel from our partners as our cooperation with them deepens. This bill is in the spirit of continuing that partnership, giving them the best possible experience here in Australia. This will include the Submarine Rotational Force—West under AUKUS but also the US Force Posture Initiatives, the Australia-Japan Reciprocal Access Agreement and the Australia-Singapore Military Training Initiative.

Each of these brings to Australia more rotational personnel and their families, who will need housing. This bill updates Defence Housing Australia's functions to reflect that reality. It allows DHA to provide housing and housing related services to foreign defence personnel, contractors and civilian staff and charities supporting defence work. It enables the minister to direct DHA to provide housing and housing related services to other categories of persons as required, to meet operational needs. This reform was recommended by the Auditor-General in 2020, who urged DHA and Defence to align this legislation with operational needs and align the provision of housing to defence philanthropic policy. It means that our partners will be able to access defence housing without putting pressure on already stretched housing markets.

A key driver of this bill is the Submarine Rotational Force—West at HMAS Stirling in my home state of Western Australia. From later this year, a small cohort of US personnel will arrive to establish the force. And, from 2027, one UK Astute-class and up to four US Virginia-class submarines will be forward-rotated to Western Australia, supported by thousands of personnel and their families. This initiative involves the rotational deployment of United States and United Kingdom nuclear powered submarines along with their personnel, civilian staff and contractors and their families. Housing for these families during rotations is a strategic enabler, and, without it, capability and readiness are at risk.

Local governments and community groups have rightly raised concerns that increased defence rotations in parts of the country like the southern suburbs of Western Australia could put pressure on the local housing markets. This bill responds to that concern by giving Defence Housing Australia the tools it needs to build dedicated supply. Defence Housing Australia has already signed contracts for 550 new homes near Fleet Base West in the southern suburbs of Perth over the next five years, ensuring secure accommodation close to HMAS Stirling.

We know that this provision of housing is crucial both to operational readiness and to shoring up our housing supply. By using Defence Housing Australia to deliver this purpose built housing, we help absorb the demand, reduce pressure on the local market, support the wellbeing of personnel and their families, support our partners and maintain defence's standing in the community.

We know that housing supply is a challenge right across the country. This bill complements Labor's broader plan to deliver more homes nationwide, from the Housing Australia Future Fund to our new national housing targets and this bill, which ensures the needs of our Defence Force are met. We are doing everything we can—pulling every lever to free up housing in the local market. We're building more homes and helping more young people into their first home, with the Prime Minister announcing just today that we're bringing forward five percent deposits for first home buyers to October this year.

Every lever matters. Every action counts. This allows us to use defence housing for our partners and for other crucial contractors who will make AUKUS a reality, and it does that without placing extra pressure on local housing markets. Stable, secure accommodation for our Defence Force and our partners will allow personnel to focus on their duties, integrate into local communities and maintain the operational capacity required to safely manage the advanced submarines that will come with AUKUS.

This bill is about supporting Defence personnel and their families. It is about strengthening our ties with our partners, which is crucial to our nation's security and to the future of our Defence Force. This modernises the DHA Act, aligning it more closely with operational needs. It will reduce strain on local housing markets and ensure that Defence has the infrastructure it needs to meet our commitments to allies and strategic partners. It is a practical, forward-looking bill that ensures we can deliver on the commitment we have made to the Australian people to invest in our nation's Defence future, to invest in AUKUS, to create jobs, to protect our nation's interests. I commend this bill.

Malcolm Roberts (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Defence Housing Australia Amendment Bill 2025 is an admission of failure on two fronts: the housing crisis and our ability to defend ourselves. Defence Housing Australia is the agency tasked with putting a roof over the heads of our Australian Defence Force personnel, the fine people who serve all Australians. This bill will extend that mission significantly to include housing foreign military personnel. This bill is a flow-on consequence of the housing crisis, a catastrophe.

It has been generated particularly out of concern for the situation in Perth. They, like all of our capital cities, are in an acute housing crisis, with a rental vacancy rate of 0.7 per cent, which is frankly shocking. Only Darwin and Hobart are slightly worse. Perth is lined up to cop the brunt of foreign personnel increases related to AUKUS under Submarine Rotational Force West, which is expected to accept thousands of foreign military personnel and contractors in relation to AUKUS preparations. This bill, though, isn't just related to Perth. It extends the ability of Defence Housing Australia to house foreign personnel anywhere in the country.

Concerns have been raised about Defence Housing Australia's ability to take care of our current soldiers. I want to now focus on Defence's wilful, sustained, ongoing lack of care and accountability. 7 News Townsville reported on the story of Mitchell Connolly, a Townsville soldier who has been asking Defence Housing to fix black mould in his house that has been making his children and pregnant wife sick. After being ignored on all proper channels, he went to the media as a last resort and is now facing retribution for raising those complaints. That goes to the key problem with the Liberal and Labor approach to defence. Boats, submarines and fighter jets are all important, yet the people in our Defence Force are vital, and they are spat on by the upper brass.

To demonstrate this point, I want to read parts of a letter from a pilot who can't return to this country because Defence will arrest him for being AWOL after they delayed approving his sick leave for a couple of days. This is from his letter to me:

Dear Senator Roberts,

My name is Daniel Dare and I served for more than eleven years as a pilot in the Royal Australian Air Force.

I am writing to ask for your help and to place on the parliamentary record how senior Defence officials handled my case after a serious abuse of administrative power by my Commanding Officer (CO).

My immediate aim is a simple: To be able to return to Australia safely and be with my family and support network, so that I can recover, as I have not been able to return to Australia for over eighteen months.

I am not seeking to excuse my conduct.

I am asking Parliament to consider whether the response was appropriate, proportionate, consistent with what Defence leaders tell Australians about empathy, prevention and member wellbeing.

Like many other ADF members, I joined straight after school.

I deployed in flying and non-flying roles overseas and at home, including the Middle East and support after bushfires, floods and cyclones, and work during Operation Aged Care Assist.

I am grateful for those years and for my colleagues.

My concerns are not with them but with a leadership culture that, when confronted with an avoidable problem, chose escalation over resolution and appearances over duty of care.

In March 2023, after more than a decade of unblemished service, my CO accused me of expressing a negative view of the Squadron to another member.

The allegation was based on a text message I did not write, disseminate, or even know existed. An extremely flawed "fact find" was conducted, which did not include interviewing me.

On that basis the CO attempted to impose a twelve-month formal warning and cancel an already-approved flying instructor posting, despite lacking the authority to cancel the posting and despite the Air Force's desperate need of flying instructors.

Through later freedom-of-information requests I learned that legal advice was sought by the CO only after the punitive action had begun. The effort was abandoned only when I retained a civilian solicitor: Cameron Niven, of Soldier's Legal Counsel, who persuaded the CO's direct superior to drop it due to the deficiencies.

But by then the damage was already done. The episode was plainly maladministration.

It shattered any trust I had left in the organisation, leaving me completely disillusioned and was the point at which my mental health began to deteriorate.

Rather than pursue a medical discharge, I first tried to leave in a way that protected the taxpayer and kept me available if needed.

I applied to transfer to the Air Force reserves from December, totalling twelve years of full-time service, and agreed in advance to repay any service debt.

My new chain of command supported the application.

A delegate in the Directorate of Personnel—Air Force, denied it without even bothering to ring me and initially refused to return the application with his written reasons, in an apparent attempt to prevent me from redressing the denial.

My lawyer Mr. Niven was once again required to intervene, simply to get a document that should have been provided in the first instance. That became the pattern: stonewalling, delay and an aversion to transparent decision-making.

By late 2023 I was on medical sick leave. The grievance and review processes dragged with little substantive progress. As 31 March 2024 approached, being the date for medical review, I requested an extension of sick leave and, as a contingency, applied for long service leave from 2 April.

The application for long service leave was refused, and I was directed to report for duty on 2 April despite documented medical concerns.

Returning under those circumstances would have breached basic work health and safety obligations.

In the absence of a timely decision on my sick-leave extension, I made the difficult decision not to present for duty on 2 April in order to protect my wellbeing.

The response was senseless.

Military and civilian police were sent to my home to arrest me and return me to base in handcuffs, but I was overseas by this point.

The next phase escalated further.

An international pursuit was coordinated, drawing on ADF, Australian Federal Police, DFAT and foreign law-enforcement resources, all at the taxpayers' expense. Group Captain Maria Brick, then Director of the Strategic Incident Management—Air Force section, coordinated actions; a five-year arrest warrant was issued by Air Commodore Bradley Clarke, Commander Air Mobility Group,

I do not contest Defence's power to enforce discipline.

I question the appropriateness and proportionality of deploying such resources against one unwell member whose recent maladministration, attempt to voluntarily discharge and medical circumstances were known to the chain of command.

One act in particular crossed a line.

Air Marshal Robert Chipman, then Chief of Air Force, now Vice Chief of the Defence Force, wrote to my private overseas employer in his official capacity disclosing personal information about me and notifying them that I was subject to an arrest warrant under military law.

That letter is now the subject of a complaint to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner.

It is difficult to reconcile such an approach with what Air Marshal Chipman told the Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide, only weeks earlier, on the 13th of March 2024 about harm prevention, member wellbeing and empathy in leadership.

Publicly, Air Marshal Chipman emphasised avoiding the conditions that lead to ill-health and named empathy as the most important attribute of command.

Privately, he chose the most harmful and destructive punitive options available.

A key fact also emerged through Freedom of information.

Although my sick-leave extension was undecided on 2 April 2024 when I did not present for work, Defence medical approved a further six weeks on 6 April. That determination was not disclosed to me—

isn't that deceit?—

No effort was made to de-escalate or correct the record. Instead, the pursuit continued as if I had no medical status at all.

With salary withheld and my employment prospects damaged, I had little choice but to pursue medical separation.

That process itself became an unresolvable ordeal.

I was told I needed a Defence medical officer assessment to support approval of sick leave, which would resolve the absence, but I was denied telehealth access while overseas.

If I returned in person to obtain it, I would be arrested and incarcerated before I could be seen.

In April 2025 a medical delegate determined that I was unfit for further service and should be medically separated, with sick leave until separation.

Five days later a separate administrative process was initiated to involuntarily separate me, relying on the record of absence that had already been resolved by the medical decision and commencement of sick leave five days earlier.

Defence appeared to be weaponising the military justice system to maximise harm.

I continue to seek review of that administrative decision, at my own expense through the federal court.

This will unfortunately also cost the taxpayer as Defence will undoubtedly seek to fight it.

My matter was referred to the Director of Military Prosecutions, Air Commodore Ian Henderson, for trial before a Defence Force Magistrate towards the end of 2024, with the prospect of up to 12 months' imprisonment.

The human cost has been real.

During this period my great-uncle, Leslie, became gravely ill in December 2024 and passed away a few months later.

I asked to return home safely to see him, as we were close and he was dear to me.

This request was denied.

Given the existence of warrants and the charges, it was clear that if I returned, I would be arrested on arrival and held to face a DFM proceeding, without ever seeing him.

I spent Christmas alone overseas and later grieved his death, again alone and far away from family and support.

I am not seeking pity.

I am asking Parliament to consider what this says about the system's priorities when a member is plainly unwell and clearly trying to resolve matters lawfully.

I also want to be clear about responsibility.

Failing to present for duty on 2 April 2024 was my decision.

I am not seeking to excuse it.

I ask that it be seen in context: an earlier abuse of administrative power, an irrevocable breakdown of trust and disillusionment, deteriorating health, a documented medical basis for leave, and a year-long pattern of escalation rather than resolution.

A response that ignores medical evidence, amplifies risk, and privileges appearances over problem-solving is neither good administration nor good leadership.

I have also raised a concern, currently the subject of an FOI request, that the Air Force may have interfered, formally or informally, with civilian hiring of ADF pilots, namely at Qantas, to manage retention issues.

If true, this would mean that even those who have completed their obligations can face covert barriers to employment.

This matter deserves inquiry and formal answers.

Pilots who serve their country should not be disadvantaged by secret arrangements once their service is complete.

Across the period of my ordeal, I made extensive work health and safety reports about the impact of management actions on my wellbeing, no less than 27 individual reports.

Decisions consistently increased risk and pressure, and the cost was shifted to the member and, ultimately, to the taxpayer.

I am not exaggerating when I say that, due to how this situation was handled by Air Marshal Chipman and his subordinates, it cost the Australian tax payer millions.

On 13 August 2025 I was discharged. In the lead-up I asked for a short administrative extension so I would not be left without income while DVA and CSC claims were processed.

This request was refused. As I write, I am navigating those claims from overseas without income, after a year of withheld salary.

I wrote to both Matt Keogh and Richard Marles, on several occasions, seeking an intervention grounded in reasonableness.

They ignored it.

This is not only about one member.

It is about the credibility of Defence leadership before Parliament and the public.

The ADF cannot rely on deterrence theatre, secrecy and maximal punishment to solve cultural problems.

Strength in leadership is restraint, fairness and good judgement. When the system confuses severity for strength, it looks weak—

it is weak—

It wastes public money, undermines morale, and deters good people from serving.

It also undermines recruitment and retention by signalling that members who become unwell or seek a lawful exit will be treated as problems to be crushed, rather than people to be supported and transitioned safely.

ADF members deserve better processes than the ones I encountered. Taxpayers deserve better stewardship than funding unnecessary pursuits that serve the egos of senior officers, rather than Australia's interest. The public deserves a Defence organisation whose leaders model the empathy and prevention they commend in public.

Yours sincerely,

Daniel Dare.

This is what we have to fix if we ever want to have a hope of defending ourselves and housing our defence forces. We have to take care of the Australians who choose to put their life on the line and wear the flag on their shoulder. Thank you, Daniel, and thank you, every member and veteran of the Australian Defence Force. You all deserve far better.

One Nation will be supporting this bill because, without the help of allies, we are completely unable to defend our own country. That's what's happening in this country. We need a sovereign defence capability, and that starts with valuing our members—care, not systematic abuse; accountability, not bullying to cover up; and honouring Australian values, starting with mateship, a fair go and being fair dinkum. All we want is some fairness, integrity and truth.

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

The coalition will be supporting the Defence Housing Australia Amendment Bill 2025 because we support AUKUS and, of course, we support our defence forces, who do an incredible job for our country. But this issue of defence housing is, of course, linked to the broader issue of housing, because the people who are serving in our defence forces and in our kindred spirits' defence forces also require houses to live in when they are serving our nation. This bill doesn't make any provision for the additional resources which are required for housing the defence forces, and that is no surprise to me, because this is a pattern that we see across the board with Labor's housing commitments. A very good way of describing it is 'all feathers and no meat'.

What we've seen, over the weekend, on the back of the economic summit, is a litany of promises and puff pieces about what the government is going to do on housing, but let's just be clear on the record so far. This government has presided over the biggest surge in population growth since the fifties and a consequent, similarly big collapse in housing completions over the past few years. We have a larger population, the largest population that we've ever had, and a massive collapse in housing construction. Over the last three years of the Labor Party's tenure on the treasury bench, we have seen endless discussion about housing, and we see the Minister for Housing brag about the $40 billion that the Commonwealth is spending on houses—great, $40 billion on housing for fewer houses than were built under the last government. Under the last coalition government, we saw an average completion rate of 200,000 houses each and every year. Now we are down to 170,000 houses a year after three years of Labor's brainless bureaucracy.

And the incoherence of their housing agenda is just so clear. Today you see the government promising to expand the Home Guarantee Scheme. Over the weekend, they were saying they wanted to cut red tape, and now they want to become the largest mortgage insurer in the country. The government either wants to be the world's biggest bureaucracy or it doesn't. This is absolute incoherence. Either you want to cut red tape and you believe in the private economy delivering for Australians or you don't. So I am very confused; I'm extremely confused. Now, maybe it's because I'm not very intelligent. It could well be the case. But just to step through these few issues from the weekend is very hard to follow, extremely hard to follow.

We see a commitment to cut the National Construction Code. Okay, that's good; it sounds like a reasonable idea. It is very complex. There are thousands and thousands of pages and gobbledegook in it. This was the policy the coalition had at the last election. We said we'd freeze the NCC because it's complex. It is a lot of red tape. It is hurting the building sector. Builders, tradies and developers find it extremely hard to comply with. It has increased costs because of the changes that were made in 2022. So we said, 'Let's pause the NCC for 10 years.' The government said, 'That's a terrible idea,' and the Minister for Industry and Science at the time, Mr Husic, said this 10-year freeze would result in 'shoddy hotboxes'. They pooh-poohed that; they said, 'That's a bad idea; the coalition is stupid.' And now we see that the government has adopted the policy we had just a few months ago at the election of freezing the NCC, albeit a shorter freeze—it's a one-year freeze, not a 10-year freeze—and they have committed to making some changes to the code in this calendar year. I'm not sure what those changes will be. From the government's point of view, they're promising the Australian people less red tape, but, in order to deliver that, they're going to change the code in 2025 and then have a freeze until 2029. That's the first thing.

The second thing they announced on the weekend was that they would try to push housing approvals through the EPBC Act. That is a very good idea. Again, this was a policy that we had at the election because we recognise that the way that the government has administered the EPBC Act over the last three years has resulted in fewer houses being approved and developed. In fact, in one development that I visited in Queensland—one of the largest in Australia, which has been releasing lots of land since 1989—last year was the first year they hadn't released any lots, because of the EPBC Act. A parrot flew over a block of land in 1971 and now we can't have any houses there. It's the administration of the EPBC Act which has been causing a loss of housing supply, so we welcome the view that the government now has, that it will try to use the EPBC Act to push through approvals and supply. We welcome that.

Then we see the government has today announced plans to expand the Home Guarantee Scheme. As I say, it is incoherent at best to be arguing that you want to cut red tape and help the private economy get houses built and help people get into houses while also arguing that the way to do it is for the government to become the largest mortgage insurer in the country and to become a property developer. These are the two policies announced during the last campaign, which Labor won. Labor said that they would become the largest mortgage insurer and that they would develop 100,000 houses. This is from a government that has a $10 billion scheme, the Housing Australia Future Fund, that, in two years, with $10 billion of the people's money, has built 17 houses. It has been running for two years and has built 17 houses. We think it's 17. The minister said 17, zero, 2,000—who knows? Either way, even if it were 2,000 for $10 billion after two years, it is not a very good return.

The idea that Canberra is going to solve the nation's housing crisis by becoming a massive property developer and insurer is crazy. When you look at the idea of expanding the Home Guarantee Scheme, which was initially designed to target low-income earners, to everyone, it means that the children of billionaires can now use the Home Guarantee Scheme to fund their first house purchase, which is bizarre—at the least—mistargeted and very dangerous. What about the size of the contingent liability that the taxpayer now faces? How big is that? Tens of billions of dollars, I imagine, because the taxpayer is now funding these insurance products for wealthy Australians. Why are the taxpayers of Australia funding a mortgage insurance scheme for wealthy Australians? I don't know the answer to that question, and I'm not sure the government knows the answer to that question. I think they like the idea of putting out press releases and puff pieces about how well they're doing on housing, when the stats on the scoreboard are very clear: more people and fewer houses, and that is why we have a massive housing squeeze.

First home owners have never faced a larger cliff. Offering a five per cent deposit scheme to middle- and high-income earners is not the right policy for Australia. The taxpayer should not be required to fund that. The Australian people ask themselves why we now look at 10 years of budget deficits. This is one of the reasons. This idea, that the taxpayer should be funding a huge amount of middle- and now upper-class welfare, is a sick proposition that the Australian people should not have to fund.

When you ask about housing and you look at the Defence Housing Australia Amendment Bill 2025 before the Senate today, the point is really on supply. These demand-side endeavours, if targeted, can potentially make some improvements for low- and middle-income Australians. But the proposition that is facing the Australian people is really one of a lack of housing supply. Until the government is able to better understand what is holding back the supply, by talking to builders, developers and tradespeople, then they will never solve this crisis. Unfortunately what we now see are more bandaids, more press releases and more puff pieces, and, frankly, an incoherence. Either the government believes that cutting red tape is a good idea or it believes that the Commonwealth government should be the provider of all services. It can't be both.

We want the government to be better. Our job is to work very hard to highlight the deficiencies in policy whilst we develop our own credible solutions. So we welcome the idea that the EPBC Act could be improved in terms of its administration. We are quite relaxed about the idea of a home guarantee scheme targeted at low-income people. And, as I say, we supported the idea that the NCC was too complex and was causing massive problems for people on the ground. So we are open-minded to supporting sensible ideas, but we don't think the bureaucratic approach of having housing boondoggles like the Housing Australia Future Fund and then guaranteeing mortgages for children of billionaires is the way to go. We think that that is a problem. That is a problem that I can't explain to anyone on my side of this parliament. We hope that in due course the government will be able to explain why it believes that the taxpayer should be funding mortgage insurance schemes for people with very high incomes.

Until we know the answer to that question, I'm not sure the government will be to make any headway on housing. So far, the scoreboard is that there are more people than ever and, frankly, fewer houses than we've seen at any time in the past decade.

Barbara Pocock (SA, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak to the Defence Housing Australia Amendment Bill 2025. This is the first major housing bill of the new parliament. Does it help aspiring homeowners to build their first home? Does it wind back the unfair tax handouts to wealthy property developers or fix the structural inequities in our housing market? Does it directly invest in public housing that Australians desperately need: our nurses, our teachers, our retail workers—those who live in Mildura and Mount Gambier and in all our country towns and regions that can't get housing for their police force or their doctors?

Instead this scheme builds public housing for foreign troops and foreign contractors, under the deeply flawed AUKUS pact. That's right—this government has deemed US troops and US contractors more worthy of public housing than people in Australia who desperately need a roof over their heads. Over 170,000 Australian households are on public housing waitlists. Homelessness in this country is the worst in living memory, according to the many advocacy groups who knock on the door of all of us in this place. What is the government doing? Rushing through a bill that would allow for hundreds of new homes to be built without delay but built for US troops and US defence contractors. The fact that this is the government's priority beggars belief. So much for 'no-one left behind'. So much for 'tackling the housing crisis from every angle', as we've heard the Minister for Housing say in recent days.

This contradiction exposes the rot in Labor's housing priorities. We're in the middle of a national housing crisis, including a severe lack of public housing. The message is clear from this legislation: if you're an American soldier or an American defence contractor, the government will build you a home; if you're an Australian worker, fend for yourself or join the long queue of people looking for public housing. While our homelessness queues grow and there are tents in my own city's national and state parks, funding goes in an unspecified amount—we don't how much—to support other countries' militaries.

The Greens have many issues with this bill. Defence Housing Australia currently provides around 20,000 homes to defence personnel in Australia and their families, and it makes a profit on the housing scheme. However, this bill would expand Defence Housing Australia's main function to include the ability to provide housing and housing related services to foreign government and defence personnel. The government argues that the intention of this bill is to reduce strain on the housing market, but it just paints a clear picture of hypocrisy. Rentals in Perth have become amongst the most expensive in this country—and that's really saying something, if you look at the price of renting in Canberra or in Adelaide. When the Greens urgently call for investment in public housing, the government refuses to act. But, when the US asks, suddenly it's not impossible for governments to build houses anymore, this time for non-Australians.

The scope of changes in this bill is really worrying. In addition to foreign personnel, Defence Housing Australia will also be able to provide housing to foreign military organisations, foreign governments and foreign military contractors and subcontractors. It also allows the minister, by legislative instrument, to add further classes of people to whom Defence Housing Australia may provide housing and housing related services. These broad provisions are one of the many reasons why we needed to see, wanted to see and should have seen an inquiry into this bill. Minister Keogh has said he wants to see the speedy passage of this legislation. Well, that explains why Labor and the Liberals teamed up to veto an inquiry into this legislation in the last sitting fortnight. Now, it's being rammed through the Senate. There is no financial impact statement. It's incredible. We have no idea how much public money Australia will allocate to build homes for the US military in Australia.

This bill will give a blank cheque to the US military and Donald Trump as part of AUKUS. It's deeply concerning that, in a housing crisis, Labor would sooner—would prefer to—provide housing to foreign troops than provide it to the Australians pushed in every city and town in this country to the brink by their policy decisions. That is thousands of Australians on waitlists for public housing, thousands of teachers and nurses who can't get the houses they need to live near their jobs and the services they depend on. This government is focused on funding the wrong homes. Across Australia, housing costs are rising faster than wages, and our social housing system has failed to keep up with demand. According to Everybody's Home, our proportion of social dwellings declined to just 4.1 per cent of the market in 2024. This decline has forced more people into the private rental market, intensifying competition and driving prices higher across the board. Everyone deserves a safe, affordable place to call home. But, for too many Australians, this goal is now completely out of reach. The government has suddenly remembered, in this bill, that it can build houses directly, but this time for US workers and contractors.

Housing is essential for Australians, just like health care, education and child care. We shouldn't be leaving it to the private market. Decades of profit driven policies have left too many people with skyrocketing rents, substandard housing and long-term homelessness. The declining role of the state in building public housing stock in our country has significantly contributed to the decline in housing affordability for both renters and first home buyers in our housing system. In a housing crisis, the supply of homes cannot be left to private developers whose profits increase the more that house prices and rents go up.

We just need the government to care as much about building public housing for Australians as they clearly do for US troops. Maybe they could take inspiration from the Greens policy for a public property developer and build 610,000 homes over the next decade. Let's have housing for all Australians. This is the kind of ambition needed to fix the housing crisis, not just tinkering, and especially not tinkering in ways, like those of the amendments to the deposit scheme that we heard about this morning that are being brought forward by the housing minister, that drive demand. They will feed demand, push up exploding prices even further and a lock out first home buyers. Less tinkering; more structural change.

Part of the justification for this bill is to provide housing for US troops stationed in WA as part of the AUKUS submarine base in Fremantle. AUKUS is a dud deal. We need to get out of it. AUKUS is supposedly a trilateral partnership, and Australia has drawn the short end of the stick. We bear the brunt of both the cost and the risk. While the US and the UK are reviewing the pact, the major parties have doubled down, committing to a shroud of silence and secrecy.

We know the US or the UK could pull out of the submarine deal with just a year's notice if either nation decides the deal weakens their own nuclear submarine programs, yet we've already sent at least $1.6 billion to the US for their own domestic shipbuilding industry. We're also paying the UK around $4.6 billion to assist theirs. We don't have any clawback provisions. Recent polling shows that most Australians believe we'll never receive the AUKUS submarines, and they can see this dud deal for what it is. Australians have never had the chance to properly vote on AUKUS, something that fundamentally undermines our sovereignty and diverts crucial funds from housing, education and health care. How is this fair? How is it sensible?

I and many Australians are greatly concerned about our increasing dependency on the US, led by an unpredictable bully. We know Australia is complicit in unjust US wars. Donald Trump has effective control of all US marine spy bases, bomber jets and nuclear submarines across Australia. As the US lurches further to the unpredictable right and the costs of AUKUS submarines spiral upwards into the hundreds of billions, now is the time to end the dangerous AUKUS gamble with our security. Instead, we get bills like this which further entrench this pact.

We also get bills like last year's Australian Naval Nuclear Power Safety Bill 2024. That bill, now an act, allows the government to pick any place in Australia as a potential nuclear waste dump without any proper consultation with communities and Indigenous owners. It explicitly listed Osborne, in my state of South Australia, as home to a nuclear waste dump. The local community was absolutely blindsided. They were not informed or consulted. The dump is close to a residential area and right on the waterway, where 30,000 people live nearby. When interviewed on 7.30, Minister Butler said that a dump in his electorate would go ahead 'even if the residents did not want it'. Well, Minister Butler, they do not want it. I've been an active campaigner against nuclear waste dumps in South Australia for a long time, and so have thousands of South Australians. We don't want it anywhere near us. This is not democracy. This is against the wishes of the Port Adelaide Enfield Council, who have resolved to strongly oppose any nuclear waste storage or disposal at Osborne. It's against the wishes of so many South Australians who remember the devastating impact that British atomic testing at Maralinga had on our Indigenous people.

The corrosive AUKUS pact puts the wants and needs of the US above the wellbeing of our communities, and we see that again in this bill. We need to end AUKUS and invest in peace, security and housing for all Australians who need it. Australians want us to develop our own independent foreign policy that defends Australia and does not continue to act as an arm of the US military.

This bill makes it clear that the only public housing Labor and the Liberals really want to spend money on is for the US military and for US weapons contractors living on Australian soil, all while hundreds of thousands of Australians wait for decades on public housing waitlists. Both major parties are not taking the scale of this issue seriously enough. They are tinkering at the edges, and much of their tinkering makes the problem worse by feeding demand and giving enormous tax breaks to wealthy property investors. That tinkering makes things worse for all those first home buyers and young people who are paying excessive rent or unable to get into the housing market.

Both major parties have entered this parliament with a handful of meek offerings that will do little to challenge the massive problems in our housing system. In a wealthy country like ours, housing should not be something Australians struggle to get access to. It should not be something we build for US defence workers and contractors. It is shameful, and we need immediate, big structural reforms on our housing crisis. The options we see from the major parties are clear choices by our governments that compound their mis-decisions of the last 20 years.

This bill shows we can build public housing, and we need to get on with it. But we need to build housing for Australian people in our regions, towns and cities who can't get it right now. While the major parties play politics here in Canberra with housing, people all over Australia are experiencing the devastating reality of soaring rents, crippling mortgage stress, acute homelessness, increased homelessness and a lack of truly affordable homes. This government needs to take the Australian housing crisis seriously, and Labor need to step up and build homes for Australians. Build the public housing we need, not the foreign Defence workers' and contractors' housing that will squeeze out Australians' own need for solutions to the housing crisis.

Slade Brockman (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I too rise to speak on the Defence Housing Australia Amendment Bill 2025. Obviously it's welcome that this government is finally taking some of the first steps required to see AUKUS come to fruition in this country. It is a policy that, in rhetoric, anyway, has been supported by those opposite, the Labor Party, for a significant period of time—in fact, for the entire life of the AUKUS project, which of course started under the coalition government.

However, quite frankly, this is too little too late. It is just reflective of the failure of this Labor government and the state Labor government in Western Australia to seize the urgency of the requirements of AUKUS and make the concrete building blocks necessary to see this come to fruition. I had the current status of Henderson and AUKUS in Western Australia described to me, by someone who knows this very, very intimately, as a debacle under this Labor government, a debacle under the state Labor government in Western Australia, because—for one reason, at least—the building blocks have not been started. Yes, this bill is a positive step, and we will support it; however, the requirement for the US presence at Stirling is for thousands of accommodation units to be available, starting in 2027-28. Passing legislation to start a process to build houses just two years before you're going to need those houses to be finished shows how unserious this Labor government actually is in this space.

I'll give another example—and this has more of a state Labor focus, but the federal government could use its influence to make a difference in this area. The major road into the Henderson precinct, the Australian Marine Complex, the intersection of Rockingham Road and Russell Road, is an intersection where I have stood and watched trucks and cars get banked up for hundreds and hundreds of metres. It is a horrendously dangerous intersection. It's effectively two Ls, with traffic lights at both intersections of the Ls. It's a very slow, very inefficient intersection that has needed realignment for a long, long period of time. It last had significant work done in 2002; that's 23 years ago. Currently, as far as I can tell—maybe there's some work happening behind the scenes—nothing has been significantly planned to make sure that intersection is fixed before the significant naval shipbuilding projects in the Henderson precinct hit their straps, such as the new Mogami build that should be starting in Western Australia this decade. The fourth ship is meant to be built in the Henderson dockyards this decade, and these basic, fundamental building blocks, such as having an efficient road into the precinct, have not even been started yet.

This is an extraordinary failure of leadership. We've had 3½ years of Labor government federally and we've had, sadly, eight years of Labor government at the Western Australian state level, and every single one of those senior ministers, premiers, prime ministers and ministers have talked about their support and the need to actually get these fundamentals in place for my home state of Western Australia to take advantage of things like Mitsubishi Heavy Industries' willingness to come into Western Australia to partner in Henderson to build the Mogami class frigates. They've talked a big game, but they have done literally nothing. Here, we have the federal Labor government trying to pass a bill that will start a process, which will then start a planning process that will let houses be built at some point. This is a very non-serious way to approach the most serious issue in Australia: ensuring that AUKUS is a success.

(Quorum formed)

Sarah Hanson-Young (SA, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to briefly speak on the Defence Housing Australia Amendment Bill 2025. While there is obvious contention about this particular Australian Defence Force housing issue, as outlined by my colleague Senator Shoebridge, it's not the only controversial project that this particular government department has been enacting over the last number of years.

We know—I have spoken about this in this place before—about the shocking destruction of ancient woodlands at Lee Point in the Northern Territory. In April last year, there was community outcry as Defence Housing Australia resumed its clearing of Lee Point for housing of its defence personnel and for private rentals in Darwin. I want to point to the fact that this particular part of the world is so ancient, so special and so unique. Some of the trees in this particular area that were bulldozed by Defence Housing Australia were more than 400 years old. These are ancient trees. It is an ancient woodland, and it is home to some of Australia's most endangered species. In fact, not only is it home to some of Australia's most endangered species; it plays a role in the migration of endangered birds, in particular those from other parts of the world. It is a haven for wildlife and endangered species.

The federal government gave approval to DHA to bulldoze this ancient woodland, but they didn't do their due diligence very well. The department was forced to pause the work in 2022 to assess the project's impact on the Gouldian finch, a very endangered bird that lives in this area—a beautiful little bird. It's gorgeous. If you haven't seen it, look it up online. It is a spectacular animal that lives in this area, has lived in this area and has had this woodland as its home for hundreds and hundreds of years, perhaps thousands. There are trees in this area that have played home to the Gouldian finch for over 400 years—because that is how old this woodland is. The department of Defence Housing Australia had to pause its work because of the impact on this particular bird and then had to pause it again, in 2023, following an application for cultural heritage from the Larrakia traditional owners. Not only was the department bulldozing ancient woodland; it was doing so without any approval or consent from the local Indigenous owners. At the time, Minister Plibersek, who was the environment minister, rejected the application by the traditional owners for cultural heritage. That was very disappointing. We now know that the department is back in court because of the discovery and removal of ancient artefacts from the site.

I use this opportunity to say this to the government. It has been found over and over that this particular project has not just been managed badly; it was approved illegally. The bulldozers have been in there illegally. The woodlands are being destroyed. The animals are being killed, and cultural heritage is being ignored. You've lost one court case in relation to this particular project; you're currently in court again. This bulldozing, this project, must be stopped in its tracks. There should be no bulldozing going on while this latest court case is on foot. That's the first thing. It should not be happening. At the very least, take the keys out of the bulldozers, put down your chainsaws and stop. Stop destroying this ancient woodland and the homes of these beautiful animals.

I really do urge the ministers responsible to withdraw the approval for this project in the first place. It was based on rubbish; it was continued on misinformation. I asked the minister several times, both here in the chamber and in Senate estimates, about the unauthorised and illegal application relating to this project. I was told that the information wasn't correct, only to have the court come in and say to all of those who were talking about this project being illegal that this application wasn't done in the right way and that the bulldozers had been started before the process was complete. The court upheld all of that. I haven't had an apology from the minister, by the way. But it's not about who is right here; it's about doing what is right and doing the right thing. The right thing is shelving this project to ensure that it does not continue on what is a pristine, ancient and sacred area. It is sacred to the traditional owners, sacred to the animals and important for that local ecosystem.

Only a number of weeks ago, new footage emerged of DHA bulldozers continuing their destruction despite the very serious environmental and legal questions over this project. In the wake of the federal election and everybody being a bit busy, Defence Housing Australia has sent the bulldozers back in, hoping that no-one would notice. It is not good enough, and it does beg a broader question. If the federal government can't even abide by its own environmental laws, how on earth do they expect anybody else to? There was a clear breech of the law in this case. Do you know what the fine was? For the first breech, it was $18,000. That's just doing business, isn't it? It's just outrageous. It is absolutely outrageous.

The local community in Darwin is deeply distressed by what has happened here—distressed that the community's concerns have been ignored, that this pristine area just 20 minutes drive out of Darwin is being destroyed and that the local Indigenous community has been dismissed. It's time that the federal government and the responsible ministers see this dog of a project for what it is and cancel it. They've already destroyed a significant part of that woodland, and they need to stop before they destroy all of it.

Jordon Steele-John (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Today I urge the Australian public and the members of this parliament to pay attention to the hypocrisy of this government. Today in the Senate we are debating the Defence Housing Australia Amendment Bill 2025, a bill that has been passed through the lower house without deep scrutiny or consultation from the Australian community. This bill seeks to provide public housing to US troops to support AUKUS military operations from 2027. These military operations centre around a permanent nuclear-powered submarine force, which will require US military personnel to be stationed in Australia, including off the coast of Fremantle on Noongar lands in my state.

If turning Garden Island, Meandup, into a military base and setting up a low-level nuclear waste dump isn't enough, today this bill outlines the Albanese government's commitment to building public housing for US troops who will be stationed in Western Australia. This government is trying to ram through legislation that has not released a financial impact statement, has not gone to a formal inquiry and does not detail how many taxpayer dollars will be put towards housing US troops. And yet, we are seeing their commitment to building public housing and providing a blank cheque to house the troops of the United States of America. This bill is yet another step towards AUKUS in that great journey begun by Scott Morrison, which ends with the complete transfer of our foreign and defence policy from the elected government of Australia to the administration of the United States. They will say, 'Jump,' and we will say, 'How high?' That is what AUKUS means. From day one, this political pact has been rightly criticised as a terrible deal in terms of economic cost and in terms of deliverability. For this government to have already committed to giving billions of public dollars to the United States is a disgrace. And now we are seeing our government go even further in committing to building public housing for US troops as well, all of this at a time when millions of Australians are struggling in the current rental and housing market and at the same time as our government announces further cuts to the NDIS. Yet what is their priority? Public housing for US troops. At the same time as so many in our community are struggling with the cost of energy and paying their power bills, what is the priority of this government? Public housing for US troops.

Last week, as part of the End Child Poverty campaign, I had the privilege of attending my local Centrecare branch in Mirrabooka. Community organisations like Centrecare provide crucial frontline supports to members of our community who need assistance with things like housing, mental health and crisis support. I want to say a huge thank you to you, the workers of this branch, and the workers across the many locations in our community that are supported by Centrecare. Day in and day out, you are dedicated to assisting vulnerable Australians. Your work is indispensable. During my visit, I heard from workers that poverty rates in this country are out of hand. Families are struggling to meet basic needs. We know that the impacts of inadequate and insecure housing on health and wellbeing affect the entire family, and we know that it is often kids that struggle most, that feel it most and that have their outcomes impacted.

Around 53,000 Western Australian households are currently experiencing homelessness, housing stress or living in overcrowded homes. As of May this year, WA has over 22,000 applications on hand for public housing, and the average wait time is nearly three years. Of these 22,000 applications, 7,000 are people on the priority waitlist. These are folks escaping domestic violence, experiencing homelessness or needing urgent accommodation due to disability or illness. Their wait time is dire. Yet let us roll out the red carpet, let us spare no expense, for US troops, for the United States Army, and for Donald Trump!

Australia lags behind other nations in terms of social housing supply. In WA only three per cent of housing stock is available to those on these waitlists, whereas social housing stock in places like the UK and the Netherlands totals 17 per cent and 34 per cent of all housing stock, respectively. Housing peak bodies, tireless advocates and workers in the sector are all saying the same thing: we need urgent action, we need bold intervention, and we need our government to commit to stronger housing policies that not only increase housing stock but also ensure housing is affordable and accessible to everyone. Instead of prioritising having a national conversation on rent caps or rent freezes, we have this bill that only benefits US troops.

Perth used to be Australia's most affordable city to live in, but figures from this year show that it is now the most unaffordable city for renters. Over the last five years, rent in Perth has gone up by 66 per cent. In the electorate of Swan, it has gone up by 72 per cent. In the electorate of Cowan, it has gone by 74 per cent. We saw a video recently go viral online because a rental inspection in Osborne Park saw 92 people lining up to view a single house. This is unacceptable. This is a national disgrace. We have hundreds of people competing for basic rentals. We have families, young people and pensioners all competing in a market that is so slim and so desperate. We have hundreds of people sleeping rough in the area surrounding Garden Island. The government is moving glacially to support them, yet it is likely this bill will move heaven and earth to build public housing for US troops or to house thousands of, in the words of the bill, 'international maintenance and support personnel associated with AUKUS'.

The question on everyone's mind is why the government is finding housing solutions for US troops but saying it's too difficult to find those solutions when it comes to supporting our own community. Why is this government not investing in our community's basic needs for housing, health care, disability supports and education? This is a choice. This is a conscious decision, and it is shameful. So, to recap, we have a government that is choosing to spend upwards of $300 billion on a submarine contract and an additional undisclosed amount in this newest bill to pay for housing developments for US military personnel within the context of a housing crisis that is putting Australians at risk of homelessness, poorer health outcomes and extreme distress.

Let us remind ourselves of this government's commitment to AUKUS in the very first place. A commitment to AUKUS includes parts of Australia becoming nuclear waste dump sites. It includes mass environmental disruption of our coastlines and potential for greater harm to our oceans. It includes a huge question mark over our sovereign capacity in relation to the military direction of the United States and therefore the Trump administration. It requires Australian taxpayers forking out a couple of billion dollars to help the US improve their own submarine manufacturing capabilities without guarantee the Australian government will ever actually receive anything in return, certainly not a submarine. All of this, and the Australian government is actively denying the people the chance to have either the AUKUS decision or the Defence Housing Australia Bill reviewed under inquiry.

The Greens are our community. For years the Greens and the community have been pushing to have this Labor government deliver housing to the community, to deliver supports to the community and to critically analyse AUKUS. It is incredible that the first time public housing is brought up in this parliament, it is not for the benefit of our communities but for the benefit of the US government, who continue to be driven by a US military industrial complex with Donald Trump at the helm.

The Australian Greens will be voting against this bill. We will continue to campaign with the community to see that the billions of dollars in public funds are invested in the healthcare and housing supports and services the community need—to ensure that no person in this country goes to sleep at night without a roof over their head, that no-one fleeing family or domestic violence is ever forced to endure such a situation because the waitlist for a safe home is too long and that no child is ever forced to try to get an education and learn while living in a car. In Australia in 2025, these are our priorities. That is who we would put ahead of the needs of Donald Trump, and proudly so. I condemn this bill. It brings this parliament lower. It sullies us to consider it. It shames this government to be its promoter. You should take a long, hard look in the mirror, the lot of you, and study the reflection you find there.

A quorum having been called and the bells having been rung—

Slade Brockman (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Farrell, you can't leave while the bells are ringing.

(Quorum formed)

Jenny McAllister (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Defence Housing Australia Amendment Bill 2025 will expand the main function of Defence Housing Australia to provide housing and housing related services to those making important contributions to the defence of Australia. This is recognition of the fact that the ADF, in modern times, relies on the support, services and cooperation of a wide range of external partners and organisations, including foreign militaries, who may require housing support in Australia. It also recognises the changing nature of the Defence workforce, which no longer exclusively encompasses ADF members and APS employees.

In doing so, this bill addresses a key recommendation from a 2020 report by the ANAO on the management of Defence Housing Australia. That report recommended expanding DHA's functions to provide housing for foreign exchange and visiting military personnel and to the philanthropic organisations that provide counselling and other support services to ADF members and their families. That is what this bill does. It also provides a mechanism for a defence minister to determine that DHA can provide housing and housing related services to broader categories of people to meet the operational needs of the ADF and the requirements of the Department of Defence.

As a number of senators have noted in their contributions, one of the early applications of the provisions contained in the bill will be to support our requirement to house personnel coming to Australia as part of Submarine Rotational Force—West, under AUKUS. This includes supporting the provision of housing in close proximity to HMAS Stirling for US and UK military, civilian and contractor personnel arriving in Western Australia with their families.

As was observed by the minister in the other place, the Albanese government is committed to AUKUS. We're committed to supporting our AUKUS partners appropriately and we are conscious that this should not be to the detriment of local communities. The government is also seeking to ensure that overseas personnel are integrated into local communities in order to provide them and their families the best possible experience of Australia. Using DHA to do this ensures that Australia secures housing that aligns with Defence Force standards while limiting any negative impacts that may be had on our local housing market.

Before completing, I want to touch briefly on a couple of matters raised over the course of the debate and address some of the second reading amendments which either have been moved or are to be moved at the conclusion of debate. Senators have asked questions about security screenings. The specifics of security clearance processes are appropriately confidential but require extensive checks to identify and manage risk. The Australian Government Security Vetting Agency independently conducts security assessments for all individuals who require security clearance. These assessments are rigorous and ongoing.

Senators have also asked about costs in relation to AUKUS. Specific arrangements on the housing of AUKUS personnel are subject to ongoing cost-sharing negotiations with the UK and the US. Those negotiations are proceeding under previously agreed trilateral cost-sharing principles for the broader AUKUS trilateral partnership.

The government will not be supporting the second reading amendments that either have been moved or are to be moved. In relation to Senator Lambie's, DHA's core function is to provide housing for ADF members and their families; we acknowledge and affirm that. However, a blanket 'ADF always first' requirement could undermine Defence's ability to meet international commitments or other defence partnerships, particularly in the Pacific and with close allies. More generally, Australia benefits from reciprocal housing and supporting arrangements. There are existing transparency measures through DHA's annual report, Senate estimates and reporting to Defence and parliament. Disaggregated data on housing allocations and waiting times could expose sensitive information about ADF member locations, demand pressure or deployment patterns.

In relation to the amendment proposed by Senator Shoebridge, the explanatory memorandum is self-explanatory and stands on its own terms. In relation to Senator Nampijinpa Price's amendment, this government has made a substantial investment in Australia's national security.

I would like to thank all senators who have contributed to the debate on the Defence Housing Australia Amendment Bill 2025. I commend this bill to the Senate.

Sue Lines (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question is that the second reading amendment moved by Senator Nampijinpa Price be agreed to.

David Shoebridge (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move my second reading amendment as circulated:

At the end of the motion, add ", but the Senate notes that the explanatory memorandum to this bill claims that the amendments in the bill have no financial impact".

Sue Lines (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question is that the second reading amendment as moved by Senator Shoebridge be agreed to.

Jacqui Lambie (Tasmania, Jacqui Lambie Network) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

At the end of the motion, add ", but the Senate calls on the Government to:

(a) guarantee that members of the Australian Defence Force and their families, officers and employees of the Department of Defence and their families, and persons contracted to provide goods or services to the Australian Defence Force or the Department and their families are given priority access to Defence Housing over foreign personnel; and

(b) ensure that the full costs of providing Defence Housing and housing-related services to foreign governments, military organisations and their contractors are fully recovered from those entities, and not subsidised by Australian taxpayers; and

(c) improve transparency by requiring Defence Housing Australia to publish data on housing allocations, waiting times for Australian Defence Force members, and the net financial impact of housing foreign personnel".

Sue Lines (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question is that the second reading amendment as moved by Senator Lambie be agreed to.

Sue Lines (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question is that the second reading be agreed to.