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

Senator Bragg's disallowance seeks to throw a spanner in the works of the build-to-rent scheme. That's a very good thing and One Nation will be wholeheartedly supporting it. Foreign corporations used to pay a 30 per cent withholding tax on housing investments like build to rent. Labor cut that in half, to 15 per cent.

Let's be clear: this Labor government said to foreign, corporate landlords like BlackRock, State Street, Vanguard and first state, 'We'll cut the amount of tax you pay in half.'

Forget the Australian dream of owning your own home. Labor's dream is that you live in a stack-and-pack shoebox apartment paying rent to BlackRock forever, while those foreign corporations pay less tax than you do. That's what build to rent means.

Whenever you hear 'build-to-rent', remember 'renting forever to a foreign corporation, a foreign corporate landlord and a foreign global wealth investment fund'. They'll build homes, for sure, and Australians will never, ever own them—never. It's built to rent forever.

I'll quote from the Economics Legislation Committee report into the Treasury Laws Amendment (Build to Rent) Bill 2024 and the provisions of the Capital Works (Build to Rent Misuse Tax) Bill 2024. The provisions of the bills include 'reducing the final withholding tax rate on eligible fund payments—distributions of rental income and capital gains—from eligible managed investment trust investments from 30 per cent to 15 per cent, starting from 1 July 2024'. So there you go—a tax cut in half for those global, corporate, predatory investors, who own almost everything and are determined to own everything. I'll say that again: they own almost everything and are determined to own everything.

The report states:

The draft legislation was adjusted as a result of this consultation to ensure the government's policy objective of incentivising foreign investment in BTR—

Build-to-rent—

including affordable housing supply, is achieved.

They are admitting that the objective of the bills is incentivising foreign and predatory corporations into owning your home. The report also states:

The Property Council advised the 15 per cent tax rate for investment in housing is already available to Australian investors. The MIT—

managed investment trust—

withholding tax rate applies to withholding tax that goes back to overseas investors—

Predators and parasites—

but foreign investors can also capital partner with Australian investors.

That is the most telling part of all. This bill would only change the tax treatment of foreign, predatory, multinational corporations. That's all. There's nothing for Australians. Australian companies could do it. Foreign companies pay a penalty—that's a good thing. Yet the Labor Party of Australia would change that; you in the government would change that. Are Labor the party for Australia, or are they the party for global, foreign corporations? Build-to-rent answers that question clearly. Clearly Labor are for the foreign corporations like BlackRock, Vanguard, State Street and First State. One Nation, though, is for Australians owning their own homes.

I'm going to do something a little unusual and quote extensively from the coalition senators' dissenting report on the build-to-rent bills—an outstanding report. I hope you don't mind, Senator Bragg. It goes to the very heart of what's wrong with the new Labor Party:

Build to Rent has had minimal cut-through in Australia because our tax settings are designed to favour individual, 'mum and dad' investors, not institutions. That is appropriate.

This legislation seeks to tip the scales in favour of institutions through tax concessions, in order to make Build to Rent projects profitable for industry super funds and foreign fund managers. Labor thinks that institutions need a leg up over Australian first home buyers.

Why? The report continues:

Dr Murray was critical of the Bill's attempted perversion of our tax arrangements:

It's not clear to me why local investors shouldn't be advantaged over foreign investors in Australian housing. I don't see that there's a good argument … for levelling the playing field there. It's not clear to me, if the intention is to attract super funds into this, why owning your own home via your super fund and renting your own home from your super fund is better than owning your own home and using that money to buy what is the best asset to own in retirement.

That's just like One Nation policy. The report goes on:

At the public hearing, the Association of Superannuation Funds of Australia ('ASFA') suggested that Australians would prefer Black Rock and Cbus be the nation's landlords—

Really? You would?

and described mum and dad investors as undertaking a 'hobby activity'—

How condescending; how arrogant—

Senator BRAGG: Do you think the Australian people want to rent their house from a super fund?

Mr Clare: I think that they would be very happy with institutionally owned residential property where there is an option of having longer-term tenancies rather than the more-typical-in-the-market situation where there is a lack of assurance of continuity of tenancy because it's a small-scale, hobby activity for individual landlords.

The report continues:

This is the view of a vested interest. Most Australians would not agree with this proposal.

Other witnesses did not share ASFA's view. Grounded Community Land Trust Advocacy told the Committee:

Senator BRAGG: Are you concerned that we are seeing a corporatisation of housing in Australia?

Mr Fitzgerald: Absolutely. This is delivering horrifying results in the Northern Hemisphere, and this legislation makes no account of that—

No account of what's actually happening—

It perplexes me that this government, which purports to be in support of labour—

That is, workers—

is allowing rent-maximisation strategies to come through unabated. Yes, I agree: pushing mum-and-dad investors out of the housing market will result in less competition—

An oligopoly for the big fellas—

What we're seeing in the Northern Hemisphere is a horrific new software program called YieldStar, which in Atlanta coordinates rental increases for 81 per cent of rental properties. The board of supervisors in San Francisco has now banned this as a monopolistic practice—

Yet you want to bring it in—

There's just nothing in this legislation that even prepares us for what's coming.

The report goes on:

The Housing Industry Association pointed to the importance of Australia's housing market maintaining a focus on individual ownership.

Senator BRAGG: But isn't it the case that the character of the housing market in Australia is largely focused on individuals? … Do you think that's a good or a bad design feature?

Mr Reardon: I think that is a very positive outcome, with the association and connection with home and with location, and a sense of place and purpose—all of those dynamics.

This is reinforcing what we already know and what Senator Bragg has already discussed. Mr Reardon goes on:

All the evidence shows that people who own their own home are far less likely to be incarcerated and more likely to be gainfully employed. All of the evidence shows positive economic, social and cultural outcomes.

Personal responsibility is a cornerstone, a foundation of a safe and productive society. Personal responsibility enables and is the basis for a safe and productive society.

Senator Bragg's report then says:

Australians are not interested in subsidising institutional investors. When asked what organisations would be the key beneficiaries of Build to Rent tax concessions, Treasury confirmed that foreign fund managers would be at the centre:

There are a lot of foreign investors using the MITs because of the withholding tax concessions and other benefits from using that structure, but there can also be domestic investors using the MITs; they just get a different tax regime. Those investors will be working in partnership with commercial developers to develop these buildings.

The report continues:

Cbus Super has previously committed to scaling up in the Build to Rent sector, announcing a plan to scale up its portfolio to approximately $2 billion in apartments.

Some of the most alarming evidence from the public hearing was that the passing of this Bill could see Australian taxpayers subsidising foreign governments in their investment in our housing market. Dr Murray warned:

I find it interesting because we've already even got foreign investment funds doing build to rent. What's even funnier is that the largest one is a foreign government. We've got the Abu Dhabi Investment Council, who owns the Smith Collective on the Gold Coast, which is 1,251 build-to-rent dwellings, and we're now proposing to offer them a better tax treatment for something they're already doing—through a foreign government. I find that a bizarre outcome of this proposed bill.

It is bizarre. The report continues:

Approaches like Build to Rent endeavour to emulate the corporate housing model which has seen a downturn in the United States housing market.

Fund managers have become the predominant landlords in the US—

I will digress from Senator Bragg's dissenting report for a minute. The bankers in the United States said in the 1920s that their dream was a combination of predatory behaviour and legislation to get a monopoly and own every house that they could in the country—to control people—because once people have their residence at stake, they are easily controlled. The report says:

Fund managers have become the predominant landlords in the US. According to the US Government Accountability Office ('the GAO'), large institutional investors emerged following the global financial crisis, purchasing foreclosed homes at auction in bulk and converting them into rental housing.

In 2023, corporate housing funds held $1 trillion USD in assets. In Atlanta, Charlotte and Jacksonville, institutional investors own 25, 18 and 21 per cent of the rental stock respectively.

That is what you are wanting here. We don't want it. The report continues:

This corporate housing model, in order to generate a return on investment for institutional investors, relies on individuals being locked into a cycle of perpetual renting—

This is exactly what we've been warning for the last five years. It continues:

There is a growing consensus in the US that this model has failed and is hurting prospective first home buyers. Lawmakers from both sides of politics are introducing legislation to limit institutional investment accordingly—

Watch what's happening; this has failed—

While the US is moving away from corporate housing, the Australian Labor Party is forcing Australians into it.

Well, Senator Bragg, I'm not ashamed to admit we probably couldn't have written it better ourselves; thank you.

Build-to-rent is an abomination that destroys the Australian dream of owning your own home. One Nation raised this cruel reality years ago. One Nation rejects making Australians forever renters to a cartel of greedy foreign corporations.

Honourable Senator:

An honourable senator interjecting—

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

Let's see if you repeat that: One Nation rejects making Australians forever renters to a cartel of greedy foreign corporations, predatory parasitic corporations and parasitic predators driving the World Economic Forum and the United Nations agenda, on your conscience. All Australians should be able to work hard and one day own their own slice of this great, big, wonderful country with so much potential. Only One Nation has the policy to make this real for everyday Australians.

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

I rise to speak in opposition to this motion from Senator Bragg. We have here yet another housing stunt from Senator Bragg that attempts to deny everyday Australians the right to safe and affordable housing. This is the second time in as many months we've had to come in here and remind those opposite of some basic truths about housing in Australia. Last month Senator Bragg told us that the Australian dream of homeownership is slipping away. This week he's called our policies on housing 'crazy ideas' and has vowed to stand in the way of real progress to tackle the housing challenges we're seeing across the country, and now, with this disallowance, he wants to raise taxes on builders and rip away incentives that are unlocking tens of thousands of new rental homes.

The Liberals have no credibility on housing. The Liberals are housing hypocrites, and Australians can see right through it; they know the facts. Under the Liberals, housing affordability went backwards. They slashed investment, left supply entirely to the market and did nothing meaningful for renters. They did not build homes. They didn't even have a housing minister at the cabinet table. And since they were booted out of government by the Australian people in 2022, they have done nothing but stand in the way of meaningful action to get more people into homes. They have opposed the Housing Australia Future Fund, they've argued to scrap our housing target and now they're trying to stand in the way of our build-to-rent scheme. Instead of working constructively with us to tackle this issue, they stand in the way.

The matter before us today relates to legislation passed last year to boost build-to-rent housing—new rentals with five-year leases and no-fault evictions. Ultimately, it's about increasing rental supply and giving tenants more certainty. Independent experts have said it strikes the right balance, and industry estimates show it will support 80,000 new homes across the country. Let me say that again: 80,000 new homes for renters. Are these guys serious? They propose to stand in the way of 80,000 homes for Australians and to stand in the way of affordable rental housing for Australians who need it. It's really no wonder that the coalition went backwards at the election in May.

Senator Bragg claims our build-to-rent reforms are a foreign investor tax cut and promote the Australian nightmare of lifelong renting. That's pure fearmongering. We know that, in order to tackle this housing challenge, we have to pull every lever. We must do everything we can. Build to rent doesn't stop anyone buying a home. It builds new rental supply, which we desperately need, and, after a decade of Liberal neglect on housing, threatening to rip away the incentives to drive 80,000 rental homes is the real nightmare.

To qualify for these tax settings, developments must meet strict conditions: at least 50 dwellings under single ownership for 15 years, minimum five-year leases as the default, at least 10 per cent of dwellings offered at affordable rental rates capped below market and stronger renter protections, including bans on no-fault evictions. It's targeted policy to deliver long-term rental supply and stability. This is just one part of Labor's $43 billion Homes for Australia plan, because we know that tackling the housing crisis, which has come from a decade of neglect from those opposite, takes work from every angle. That's what we're doing—building more homes, getting more people into their first homes, getting more people into affordable homes, making renting more affordable and making renting fairer. This is the most comprehensive housing agenda in a generation.

We are investing at every stage. Yesterday, the Prime Minister announced we will bring forward our plan to deliver five per cent deposits for first-home buyers to 1 October. We're delivering the biggest boost to rental assistance in three decades. We're building 55,000 social and affordable homes and making record investment in crisis accommodation. We're setting an ambitious target of 1.2 million new well-located homes in five years. We're training more tradies in construction and attracting more of them too, with our $10,000 incentive payment. We're streamlining planning, cutting red tape and supporting modern methods—like prefab construction—to speed up builds where we can. All of this is about one thing—more homes for Australians, making it easier to buy, easier to rent and easier to build more homes. Finding an affordable place to live should not be a struggle. Whether you're a renter or a homeowner, we are standing with you to make housing more available and more affordable.

Senator Bragg has brought two motions on housing to this chamber in two months. He spends a lot of time talking about our housing agenda, but not once has Senator Bragg put forward a credible plan to build a single home, and his colleagues are much the same. All we get is negativity and obstruction, but Australians deserve better than that. Australians who are renting or looking to rent deserve better than that. Australians who want to buy their first home deserve better than that—better than the negativity that we're seeing from those opposite. Only Labor has the plan, the commitment and the determination to deliver more homes. That is why I urge the chamber to defeat this motion.

Michelle Ananda-Rajah (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Liberals and Nationals say that they want more homes, but they keep standing in the way and they have form. I was here in the first term of government, in the other place, and I distinctly recall how the Liberals, Nationals and Greens political parties teamed up and delayed the Housing Australia Future Fund. They delayed that fund—$10 billion to build social and affordable homes—for a year. Now, Senator Bragg stood up here, in this chamber, and said that it's been operating for two years and hasn't built a single home. In fact, the Housing Australia Future Fund went live in September 2024. That was the first round of funding. It has had two rounds of funding, and, right now, there are 28,000 homes that are either in planning or in construction, not just due to that but due to other measures as well.

The second important housing program that they delayed—using the same strategy: they palled up with their new best buddies, the Greens political party—was the Help to Buy scheme. That can was kicked down the road. I remember it distinctly because I told my entire electorate about it, and they weren't happy. You are gifting me another one. Thank you. I will be telling everyone in Victoria about this little stunt. You kicked that can down the road. Help to Buy was designed for the people at the bottom of the pile, the people with the most modest incomes—cleaners and people who have never dreamt of having a home. Help to Buy was designed for them. The Liberals, Nationals and Greens took it upon themselves to delay that scheme. Help to Buy enables homeowners to enter the market with as little as a two per cent deposit, with the government stumping up 30 to 40 per cent of the equity so you only need a very low deposit and have very low mortgage repayments. We're getting the states to sign on to Help to Buy, and that will also go live, providing another plank in our housing program.

But that's not all. Build to rent is a really important pillar in our housing program. For those who aren't sure about it, build to rent has actually been operating in the UK for the last 13 years. It is well-established in the UK. The UK has around 300,000 build-to-rent properties either in construction or already built. It is well-established. Yes, they are supported by the likes of pension funds. Given the scale of the problem that we are facing in Australia, which is essentially market failure staring us in the face, we have to pull multiple levers. This is a complex problem. With complex problems, just like in medicine, you've got to tackle them on multiple fronts. You don't do one thing; you do everything. Build to rent is a welcome tool in our armamentarium. It means that we deepen our access to capital markets. Increasingly, building property needs a mix of domestic capital as well as offshore capital, and that offshore capital may come in the form of pension funds from overseas or sovereign wealth funds. If they want to build homes for Australians—great; we welcome it. That was the whole point of this. Often, that capital is mixing with capital domestically as well to build these homes.

The Property Council estimate that 80,000 homes will be built over the next five to 10 years, of which 10 per cent will be ring fenced for social and affordable. These properties will have five-year tenure and prevent no-fault evictions—again, speaking to the work we have done with the states in protecting and improving renters' rights. It does mean that Australians will now have options. So, just like on 1 October, those who want to enter the housing market will now have an opportunity as we launch an expanded version of the Home Guarantee Scheme. We will now have an opportunity for those people who wish to rent for longer to do so.

But there is a presumption in this chamber that build to rent stops there, that it's lifelong renting. That's not the case. People often start renting at some point in their life, and they may transition out into homeownership. We're creating those pathways for them by expanding the Home Guarantee Scheme. There are also newer products that are emerging in Australia. It's not just build to rent anymore. Speaking to super funds here in Australia, I know that there is now a new product, build to rent to buy, which actually enables people to first enter into a build-to-rent model and then, subsequently, have the option to purchase that apartment or unit—whatever the case may be.

You can see that, by creating an ecosystem with a variety of different products out there, the market starts to shift and change to meet the needs of the consumer. That's what we're trying to facilitate as a government. We're not trying to dictate; we're trying to provide Australians, particularly young Australians, with a choice so that, if they want to enter the housing market, they can put their hand up, line up their ducks, go and see the bank, get their finances in order and delve into homeownership. On 1 October, the Home Guarantee Scheme will open up to all first home buyers. It will not be means tested. We have removed the income caps. There will be caps on properties. For example, in Victoria, in Melbourne and Geelong, properties will be capped at around $950,000. For everywhere else in Victoria, it'll be around $650,000. It's hardly the case that the children of billionaires, as Senator Bragg asserts, will be purchasing these properties. What an overexaggeration, a complete hyperbole. We are also interested in accelerating the building process by slashing red tape. We're doing that by taking the National Construction Code, for example, pausing it for a period of four to five years and simplifying it in that interim period, because we've heard feedback from the construction industry.

Sarah Henderson (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It was coalition policy.

Michelle Ananda-Rajah (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'll take that contribution. It was a suggestion by the coalition, but we're improving on that, which is worth doing. I'll also note that the Home Guarantee Scheme was a coalition legacy. What we did in our first term of government was expand the eligibility of that scheme and tune it up. What we found was that it was wildly successful. Over 100,000 households took up the modifications that we made. And so we have now gone further. We have gone further by opening it up further to first home buyers irrespective of their income, and that has garnered so much interest that the website crashed yesterday. The website crashed.

So I think it is genuinely perplexing, given the scale of the problem—and we see it every day on our streets in Australia. We see it on the footpaths, people sleeping on our footpaths, even in wealthy electorates, like mine, as it was, Higgins. There it was. I also knew that families were living in cars in council car parks in Higgins—in Higgins, one of the wealthiest electorates in Australia. If it's bad there, imagine what it's like elsewhere. We have not just people living in tents; we now have people living in tent cities. There are around 122,000 Australians who are homeless every night, based on data from a census four years ago. We think that number is much worse now. Back then, around 8,000 people slept rough, including around 200 children under the age of 12. Those numbers may well be worse now.

This is an emergency. Start treating it like an emergency, Liberals and Nationals, and stop blocking our housing agenda. This is an emergency. You don't do one thing; you do everything. At the end of the day, the only thing that matters is the outcome. The outcome is more homes for Australia and more homes for Australians.

Maria Kovacic (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister to the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm going to change the start of my speech because I won't be lectured in this chamber by a party that has facilitated the worst housing crisis our country has ever seen. You lecture us on what we should and could do, when you have stood by and allowed this to occur. For the best part of 20 years, I assisted young people and everyday Australians to purchase their own homes. Not once did anybody walk up to me or sit down with me and desperately say, 'I want to be a forever renter.' They came to me and said, 'Can you please help me buy a home? Can you please help me find a way to have a roof over the head of my family that belongs to us?' The problem with the build-to-rent scheme is that it focuses too much on build-to-rent. This government focuses far too much on build-to-rent as a solution.

A number of times today in this chamber, in different speeches, I have heard people from the other side say that build to rent is a supply-side solution. Build to rent is not a supply-side solution for people who need to buy their own home. It is a solution for people who need to rent, but it is not a solution for people who wish to buy. It is in no way a supply-side solution to the five per cent deposit scheme. They are not connected.

The five per cent deposit scheme—as Senator Henderson correctly stated, a coalition policy and coalition measure in a previous government—is something that you require supply-side mechanisms for. On 1 October, this will be opened up to everybody, and guess what? We don't have the houses for the people to buy. Newsflash: that's not helping anybody. What it will do is artificially increase prices, because the supply-side mechanisms have not been put in place. That is the reality of what we're dealing with here.

This disallowance motion from Senator Bragg intends to stop the government handing out a tax cut to foreign investors—which promotes renting rather than homeownership. The coalition is not against foreign investors. The coalition is not against business making money. What we are against is the falsehood that build to rent is somehow a fair and reasonable alternative to people owning their own home. It is not. We want Australians to own their own homes; this government wants super funds to own those homes and for Australians to rent those homes. That is what we have a problem with.

Somebody actually made a comment to me today about masterplanned communities and how important they are in the construction sector. It made me realise that this is actually a masterplanned rental cycle from the government. The super funds will own the homes, the CFMEU will build the homes and Australians will rent the homes. We're here to tell you that we're not okay with that. We absolutely want to see fair and reasonable rentals available to Australians that want to rent or need to rent. But we must make sure that there is adequate housing stock, adequate supply and proper focus from this government to ensure that people that want to buy their own home can, not the unfair scenario of providing a five per cent deposit scheme with no additional supply of housing for young people to buy them. How disheartening is that? Thank you for that; what am I going to buy? Where is it? Where are the houses?

The HAFF, the Housing Australia Future Fund, has built 17 houses. That is extraordinary. Supercharging foreign institutional investment and ownership of Australia's housing stock in a perpetual rent-forever cycle is absolutely not acceptable. While build to rent absolutely can be part of the mix, it should not require a tax concession for foreign investors to own the homes that Australians live in. That is unacceptable. While we support foreign investment, as I said earlier, it must fit within the culture of fairness. That doesn't meet the pub test. That's just not on. This government has got their priorities completely confused. They should be focusing on people, on young Australians.

We've heard today a great deal about intergenerational fairness—that would be to facilitate young people to buy their own homes, not to give potential handouts to foreign investors to own those homes that young Australians will rent. That is not okay.

The construction code is another significant issue that feeds into the problem of housing in this country. It is a document that's almost some 2,000 pages long that is nothing but obstructive in terms of facilitating greater supply. We articulated that before the last election. We took that as a policy to the last election, and what did this government do? This government said that we were bad, that it was dangerous, that we wanted dodgy housing, that we wanted Australians to live in dodgy housing—more falsehoods that are completely untrue. What has happened now? Now they've adopted the same policy. They've changed it a little bit, tinkered around the edges, but it's pretty similar, and now the narrative is not that it's bad or promoting dodgy housing. Now, the narrative is, 'When we see good ideas, we'll acknowledge it.' Well, there you go. I'll leave you to think about that.

I think the thing that bothers me the most about this whole scenario is the suggestion that we on this side are blocking the supply of housing. We've done nothing but fight for fairness for young Australians and everyday Australians so they can own their own homes. We talk about that constantly. I've talked about it for a long time. Senator Bragg raises it very regularly as well; there's been some mirth about that from the other side. But we talk about this because we hear about this all the time. People talk to us about this every day. We are totally cognisant of the fact that there is a housing crisis in this country, but we need this government to do something that facilitates the supply of housing so that the people who wish to own their own homes can buy their own homes.

The thing that I'm going to finish with is something I've said many times, and I'm going to say it again. I have a massive problem with the fact that this government thinks it's okay for a super fund to own my own home, but I am not able to access my own super, my own money, to purchase that home. That is entirely unfair. That is entirely unreasonable. Today, there was a mention in one of the speeches around homelessness and the prevalence of homelessness. The largest growing cohort of homeless people in this country is women over the age of 55. A woman over 55 can access her super under special provisions as an emergency to pay rent to somebody, but she can't access it to buy her own home. You explain that to me and tell me that you are focused on Australians owning their own home.

Paul Scarr (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It's a real delight to follow the remarks of my colleague. There was a lot of common sense and wisdom in that presentation. I've got here the State of the housing system 2025 report from the National Housing Supply and Affordability Council. If you were to listen to those opposite, they would say to you that all the issues in relation to housing supply occurred under the previous government. But this report actually tells the truth. This is the government's own agency giving its report with respect to what the reality is of housing supply.

I want to quote a number of the key findings of this report. I quote from page 1 of the report:

The supply of new housing is near its lowest level in a decade. 177,000 dwellings were completed in 2024, falling significantly short of underlying demand for housing, which was estimated at around 223,000 for the same period—

This is under Labor—record lows over the decade in relation to new housing constriction—

This shortfall added to already significant unmet demand in the system.

…   …   …

938,000 dwellings are forecast to be completed during the Housing Accord period, which falls short of the 1.2 million target. Scenario analysis indicates that even under optimistic economic scenarios, the target will not be achieved—

Even under the most optimistic scenarios, it will not be achieved—

No state or territory is forecast to meet the share of the target implied by its population—

So you're not going to meet the target on a national level, and no state or territory is going to meet the target of its share of the 1.2 million target. The report goes on to say:

When factoring in demolitions, the net new supply is expected to total 825,000 over the Housing Accord period, which is 79,000 dwellings fewer than expected new underlying demand.

Then page 5 says:

Over the Housing Accord period that commenced on 1 July 2024—

under Labor—

the Council forecasts that gross new housing supply will be 938,000 under baseline macroeconomic conditions and current policy settings … or around 188,000 per year on average. This implies a shortfall of 262,000 relative to the 1.2 million Housing Accord target, which is a little more than the 256,900 shortfall forecast in State of the Housing System 2024.

So the shortfall actually went up in 2024-25. That's what the independent analysis is telling us.

Then, if senators representing various states and territories want to look at the position in their own state or territory, they can do so at a table on page 7. This indicates the following in terms of gross new housing supply and its ratio to share of target: New South Wales, 65 percent—so the government's own agency is saying that New South Wales will only meet 65 per cent of its share of the new housing target; Victoria is doing much better at 98 per cent; my home state of Queensland, 79 per cent; Western Australia, 81 per cent; South Australia, 71 per cent; Tasmania, 51 per cent; ACT, 78 per cent; and the Northern Territory is at an extraordinarily low 31 per cent. The report goes on to say:

After accounting for the expected demolition of around 113,000 dwellings, net new housing supply is projected to be 825,000 over the Housing Accord period, or just over 165,000 dwellings per year on average.

In comparison, new underlying housing demand is forecast to be 904,000 …

So 825,000 is projected compared to housing demand of 904,000. Houston, we have a problem, and that's what the government's own National Housing Supply and Affordability Council is telling us. There's a real issue.

During the contributions made by those opposite, they failed to refer to the positive policies the coalition took to the last election which would have made a real difference in relation to housing supply. I want to refer to some of those policies to correct the record in this place. I think one of the best policies the coalition took to the last election was to provide a $5 billion fund for road, sewerage and power works—infrastructure works—that could be applied by state and local governments to open up new land for development and to provide the infrastructure for new land to be opened up.

There was also a very good policy, in my view, with respect to processing environmental approvals under the EPBC Act. My office is in a beautiful place called Springfield in what's called the south-west corridor in Queensland, which is one of the fastest-growing areas of Queensland. There are thousands of lots which could be built on tomorrow and which are stuck in the EPBC Act process in Canberra. Some of these thousands of lots have been stuck in that process for up to five years. It is madness.

I assisted one owner of a property—I won't provide their details to protect their confidentiality—who wanted to build a childcare centre, which the area was also desperately in need of, and the rigmarole that they had to go through in terms of dealing with the EPBC Act was extraordinary. It made absolutely no sense at all; on any objective rational basis, it made no sense. It was a question of the bureaucracy simply saying no and being obstructionist until, after numerous representations, a pathway was found. The system has got to work better than that. It's just ridiculous. Thousands of lots which could have been built upon are still going through an EPBC Act process—absolutely absurd. So the coalition was right to take a policy to the last election with respect to that.

I commend Senator Bragg on this disallowance motion. I think the dream of the vast majority of Australians is to own their own house or apartment; it is not to be renters for life. You have the most control over your future destiny by being an owner of a place where you live. Owning your own house, owning your own apartment—I think that is the Australian dream, and it should be a realisable dream. Every single Australian family should have the opportunity to own their own house or apartment. I don't want us to pass policy which contributes to this notion that we're going to become a nation of renters; I think it will be extraordinarily unfortunate if that is the Australia we become.

In relation to the mechanics of the relevant regulation, I'll give you my definitive legal advice with respect to the regulation and the details. It's extraordinarily complicated. It's a maze of requirements you need to go through in relation to meeting the build-to-rent development determination. For a start, in order for something to be an affordable dwelling:

… the rent payable under a lease for the dwelling must be 74.9% or less of the market value of the right to occupy the dwelling under the lease

Just think about that. We're saying that, for something to be an affordable dwelling in a build-to-rent development, the rent payable has to be less than 75 per cent of what the market is saying the rent should be. How's that going to work? And the landlord needs to go out and test the market in terms of demonstrating that a comparable property in the same area would have a rent which is at least 25 per cent more than what the build-to-rent affordable dwelling is to have.

Then we've got income thresholds for those who are renting. If a tenant is a single adult, the income threshold is 120 per cent of average annual earnings, which I find curious. I'm not sure what the policy reasoning is behind that threshold but I find it a bit curious, if we're talking about affordable housing, that the income threshold for a single adult is 120 per cent of average annual earnings. I'm not sure why that's the case. I would have thought that, if you're providing affordable housing, your target market should be those who aren't earning over average annual earnings; that's my thought, anyway. If the tenants include two or more adults but no dependent children, then it can be 130 per cent of average annual earnings. I would have thought that what you're trying to achieve is providing dwellings for people earning less than annual earnings, so I'm not sure why the thresholds are at that rate. Then you need to test the annual earnings of your tenants on the basis of certain events which occur; you've got to do that after each assessing event, and then there is a list of assessing events. So this is complicated. And there are situations where the owner of these developments can go get a tax ruling. There's got to be monitoring and supervision of this. There will have to be auditing et cetera. Wouldn't it just be simpler to come up with policy parameters and settings which incentivise builders to go and build dwellings? Wouldn't that be simpler than coming up with this complicated scheme, which is giving tax benefits to offshore investors? It's quite extraordinary. And this will just be a tangle of red tape which will add to development costs every step of the way.

It'll be very interesting to see how this works in practice. But, on the face of it, I find it difficult to understand what the incentive would be for someone to build a dwelling—for an investment manager who's investing the funds of someone they owe fiduciary duties to with respect to how their funds are invested. I find it difficult to see how it can be in the best interests of investors to build dwellings for which they can only charge less than 75 per cent of the market rate. How do you justify that? If I was investing in a fund and someone was saying, 'I'm going to build a dwelling but charge less than 75 per cent of the market rate,' my question would be: 'Well, why am I investing in your fund? Why don't I go invest in a fund that charges the market rate?' So I'm not really sure how this is going to work in practice, and I'm not sure how withholding tax dispensation actually provides the motivation for people to do this. But it is a tangle of red tape. There's no question about that. And I really do question whether or not this will work the way it's intended to in practice.

That's why I'm very pleased to have the opportunity to support Senator Bragg's disallowance motion. I would like to take this opportunity, Acting Deputy President—and I'm sure you would agree with me—to commend Senator Bragg with respect to his advocacy in relation to housing issues. He has been a champion of the Australian dream. You dream of every single Australian owning their own home.

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

The question is that the disallowance motion moved by Senator Bragg on the Tax Assessment (Build to Rent Developments) Determination 2024 be agreed to. A division is required. It being after 6.30 pm, we will defer that vote until the next date of sitting.

Debate adjourned.