Here we are again in yet another abuse of the Senate's time and the Senate processes. I'm always happy to turn up in the Senate and talk for five minutes. It's not a burden for me, but it is a misuse of the Senate's procedures and processes to proceed in the way that Senator Bragg does. What we've seen from Senator Bragg over the course of the last period is a pretty incoherent approach—an approach that's characterised by big noise in the National Press Club, a lack of solidarity amongst his colleagues—

On a point of order on relevance, this explanation is supposed to be related to the order for the production of documents.

I've just been informed by the Clerk that there are no strict rules of relevance relating to statements from the minister.

What I'm doing is explaining that this requirement imposed by Senator Bragg on the Senate is unreasonable, and it is a requirement that is an abuse of the processes. It sits in a context where Senator Bragg's fervent opposition to doing anything at all about the housing performance of this country is completely overwhelming common sense and completely undermining the national interest. Senator Bragg says that people who support the government's agenda in housing don't have brains. That's what he said. He said that Australians who have an alternative point of view to him don't have brains. That is the kind of trap that the Liberals, the Nationals and One Nation find themselves in.

First of all, Senator Bragg characterised people in government who have an alternative view to him as communists not once, not twice, not three times but dozens of times. That is too silly for words. Everybody knows that, but it's apparently what New South Wales moderates are forced to do in order to perform for their more right-wing masters—use florid language in order to characterise. Then it goes to Australians who support the government's efforts, the biggest pro-housing agenda in our history, Senator Bragg says—and presumably Senator Henderson supports this proposition—that Australians who support the government doing this don't have brains. It's a lot like the One Nation senator yesterday who wanted to characterise those Australians who build renewable power stations in a pejorative and un-Australian kind of way. This is the problem.

The problem for Senator Bragg is that at the outset of the government's housing agenda being established, which was delayed by the Senate, Senator Bragg could say, 'There are not many houses being built at the outset.' But the problem, Senator Bragg—through you, Deputy President—is that every day more houses are built. We're not wandering around knocking them down. More houses are built, and your position becomes less and less sustainable. There have been 700,000 homes built since this government was elected—7,000 homes built and tens of thousands more on the way in the social and affordable housing area. This is a government that is delivering real change and giving young Australians a crack at the housing market. That is a good thing. Despite Senator Bragg's abuse, we will continue. (Time expired)

Speaking of the abuse of this institution, in taking note of the minister's answer or explanation—if you can call it that—it is very clear that this government is trampling all over this institution by refusing in any way to seriously address the question before this chamber. And the question is: why hasn't the government provided the five per cent deposit scheme modelling? That is the question. That is why this minister was required to come in here and explain himself last Tuesday and next Tuesday when we're back here in the bush capital because we are well paid to come to Canberra to do these jobs and to get answers for the Australian people.

The fact is that the Prime Minister said the five per cent deposit scheme, the removal of means testing and the removal of caps was going to result in a 0.6 per cent increase in home prices over six years. What we saw after the changes came in on 1 October was a six per cent increase in six months for entry-level houses that Australians might be able to purchase. That is why, I assume, the government does not want to provide the Treasury modelling and all we see is pages and pages of redacted material, which is showing this government's disrespect for the Senate. It's no wonder the Centre for Public Integrity has said this is the most secretive government since the Keating government 30 years ago by virtue of their failure to respond to Senate orders, their failure to provide proper answers to freedom of information requests, and their failure to be transparent, honest and upfront.

What they should have said is: 'Here is the Treasury modelling unredacted so people can see it, analyse it and look at the parameters. And you know what? We got it wrong. We got this wrong, or we got that wrong. We relied on that. We shouldn't have relied on this.' People will respect you more for being honest and upfront. No-one expects the government to be perfect, but we want the government to be the best government they can be, which is the job of the opposition. You wonder why people don't like politicians; this is the reason. You come in here and you give your five-minute explanation. You talk about the moon landing and all these other random things that have nothing to do with the issue at hand, which is: why hasn't the government provided the five per cent deposit scheme modelling? That is the question we've been pursuing for months.

While we're on that topic, this is part of a pattern of behaviour. This government has not provided the modelling and the detail behind their promise that rents would only go up by $2 a week when they're going to go up by up to $200 a week in places like Sydney. We can't see that modelling, and we can't see the modelling behind the tax changes which threaten to remove 35,000 houses from Australians over the next few years. So we see no modelling on five per cent deposits, we see no modelling on $2-a-week rent increases and we see no modelling on 35,000 fewer houses. That is a disgrace. The people down at the Treasury are paid to do work not for you but for the Australian people. When they do their modelling, it should be presented for the public interest. We should be able to see the parameters that you relied on when you made these schemes, when you did your budget. We should be able to see them. The fact that you are sitting on them—and that, every time you come in to give the explanations, you talk about a thousand different random things—is a disgrace.

And it is an abuse of process. By coming in here and saying the opposition are doing the wrong thing by trying to get answers, you're basically saying there's no point in having a parliament. That's what you're saying. Our job is to be the best opposition we can be, which means holding the government to account to get transparency and answers for the Australian people. You are spending billions of dollars on weird housing experiments. You are radically changing the tax code to reduce housing supply and to increase rents. These are issues that matter to the Australian people, whether they live in the cities or in the bush. They are now paying the price for your tax experiments, your weird tax surgery, in the form of higher rents and fewer homes. That is not going to help the Australian people.

We will never give up on trying to get to the bottom of these things, because that is our job. That is our job and that's what we are paid to do. So we'll keep on pursuing the five per cent deposits, we'll pursue your promise of $2-a-week rent increases—which is a joke and already a laughing-stock—and we will pursue your policy of having a deliberate design feature to reduce supply. Just because you spend billions of dollars on housing doesn't mean you get more houses. In fact, the evidence is in. After these four or five years of this Labor Party in government—you spend more money, but you get fewer houses.

I also rise to take note of the minister's response. Minister Ayres says he is happy to be here. Well, that's well and good. He needs to be here. We are in a housing crisis, and it deserves the full attention of every Labor minister to, as the Senate has requested, address the gaps in analysis and, most importantly, the gaps in policy. The Senate deserves that full response.

It is undeniable that Australia is in a housing crisis. Australians are hurting. I've spent months in recent times hearing directly from people across our country about what's going on for them—renters, young people, people with disability, Indigenous people—and about the housing crisis that is driving too many of them and their families into cars, under bridges and into severe housing stress. We have too many families who are in serious danger without a roof over their heads, young people who have given up hope of ever owning a house and renters being absolutely smashed by unlimited rent increases that mean they can't put the groceries they need in their fridges and so their kids and their entire families suffer. Many renters are just one rent hike away from losing everything and being pitched into homelessness, and governments across this country are not taking action, which they could take immediately, to cap rents and to help reduce the number of people who are living in real danger, sleeping rough. That's why the Greens have been calling for caps on rents and for an end to unfair rent hikes.

But not everyone suffers in a housing crisis. We've got 640,000 Australians in urgent need of public and community housing, but some people, despite that, are doing extremely well out of the housing crisis. While everyday people suffer, the banks are the big winners. We heard last Thursday in this parliament from the big four banks, who, between them, in the last year we've got records for, earned over $30 billion in profit. Take the Commonwealth Bank, our most profitable bank. Labor sold it for a mere $8 billion not so far back. Last year they made $11 billion in profit in the midst of a housing crisis. Our banks are some of the most profitable corporations in our country and amongst the most profitable banks on the planet.

The housing system we have was created by successive Labor and coalition governments and is deliberately designed to reward the corporate greed of the banks, property developers and investors and not ordinary people who are really struggling to get by. Last week all the big banks were unprepared to answer important questions about their profitability off the back of everyday Australians' mortgages. The big four banks refused to tell us how much of their profits came from owner-occupier loans. They also refused to tell us what the average profit is over the life of an owner-occupier or first-home buyer loan. There's research that tells us that big banks make more than $228,000 in profit from an average 30-year loan. Tax changes alone were never going to cut it.

Labor needs to take on corporate greed in the housing market by taxing big corporations, building more public homes like we used to do—we know that works, and we know that that is a major problem for us right now—and ending grandfathering for wealthy property investors. Millions of households are doing it tough while the banks profit in the midst of this housing crisis. More and more of them are suffering, and Labor is failing to take the action needed to deal with the crisis we're in. House prices and rents are out of control, and real wages are going backwards.

Working hard no longer guarantees you the chance to save for your deposit and get yourself into a secure home. No-one should live in this wealthy country without safe and secure housing that supports their wellbeing, their health, their access to the labour market and their chance of holding down a job.

Despite falling house prices, housing affordability is at a record low in our country. The solutions are clear. In a nationwide housing catastrophe, we need rent caps. We need to stop knocking down public housing. We need a massive long-term boost to public investment in good quality homes, being rented to people at prices they can actually afford. We need substantial government funding at all levels of government to match the scale of this crisis. We need stronger, consistent rental protections across the country.

We say to the minister, who will keep appearing here before the Senate: Give us the information we seek. More importantly, give us the solutions we need. (Time expired)

It's extremely important that people listening to this debate understand what we're actually discussing here today. The Senate passed a motion requiring documents to be produced to the Senate in relation to the government modelling supporting its five per cent deposit scheme. A majority of senators—we just heard from Senator Barbara Pocock, a Greens senator, and we heard from my colleague Senator Bragg, a coalition senator—required the government to produce these documents, and the government has refused to do so. The government has thumbed its nose at this Senate and refused to provide these documents, notwithstanding the order from the Senate.

This isn't just a single occurrence; this is now a course of conduct. It goes to the character of this Labor government. They do not like transparency, they do not like accountability, and they don't like integrity. It's not just me saying this. The Centre for Public Integrity—one of our outstanding non-government organisations that's at the front line of calling for greater integrity, accountability and responsibility in relation to government processes—also said it about the Labor government. Director Geoffrey Watson, a wonderful Australian who's been at the front line in dealing with corruption by the CFMEU construction division, says:

The alarming deterioration in transparency is deeply troubling … undermining democratic accountability.

That's not a Liberal senator saying that; that's Mr Geoffrey Watson.

Professor Gabrielle Appleby says:

… ministers are hiding information from the Senate and the Australian people …

They're not just hiding it from us. When they hide it from us here in the Senate, they are, in effect, hiding it from the Australian people, because we are sent here by the Australian people to perform our roles in this house of review. In order to discharge our obligations, we need the information to review, and the information we're seeking in this regard is the government modelling which supported its five per cent deposit scheme.

Senator Bragg made a very, very important point with respect to why this information is crucially important. The government did not anticipate the consequences of this scheme, and the facts prove that. There was a six per cent increase across the country in the cost of entry-level housing during the first six months following the introduction of this scheme—six per cent in six months. The government never predicted it, so we want to see the modelling. On what modelling did you base this policy? Now they refuse to give us the modelling. How are we meant to interrogate the basis for policies adopted by the government if they will not give us the information and the analysis used to form the basis for adopting those policies?

Why do they fear exposing that analysis to the sunlight of the day so that it can be examined, it can be questioned, it can be queried and we can have a debate? Why do they continue hiding information? In the words of Professor Gabrielle Appleby, 'Ministers are hiding information from the Senate and the Australian people.' This is a really important point, and I commend Senator Bragg with respect to his determination in relation to trying to get access to this information. And we will keep coming back here; we will keep coming back to the Senate and seeking explanations from the minister. We're going to hear another explanation from a minister in a few moments. I ask everyone who's listening to this debate to ask themselves: 'What are they hiding? Why are they fearful of this information being produced to this Senate and, through this Senate, to the Australian people?' It's not good enough.

We also want to see the modelling which, in the budget, said that rents would only go up by $2 a week. As Senator Bragg said, in his home city of Sydney the fear is that rents are going to go up by hundreds of dollars a week. We also want to see the modelling, in the budget, which said that, as a consequence of Labor policies, there would be a decrease in housing supply. As a direct consequence of their tax measures, housing supply is going to decrease. We want to see the modelling for that, and we want that modelling to be produced to this Senate and, through this Senate, to the Australian people.

Question agreed to.