The federal government is staring down a political challenge on a key housing bill, calling on the Greens and Coalition to back its shared equity scheme in parliament this week. It's also talking up the success of its 'Housing Australia Future Fund' - saying it's delivering new social and affordable homes to those most in need.
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00:00This fund was the centre of a bit of a political fight about 12 months ago here in Parliament
00:07House, but the government says now that it's in place it is delivering new homes, saying
00:11it's actually delivering them faster than expected.
00:14Under the first round of the Housing Australia Future Fund, it's going to fund about 14,000
00:19homes around the country.
00:20We should have a breakdown of the numbers to give you.
00:23About 13,700 in total, roughly 4,000 will be social housing, where rent is set at a
00:29level for people on low incomes, and about 9,500 are affordable homes, where rent is
00:34capped at three quarters of the market rent.
00:38Now, the way this scheme works, $10 billion has been invested.
00:42The government uses the earnings on that investment to fund these new social and affordable homes.
00:49This was, of course, at the centre of a bit of a political brawl a year or so ago.
00:53The Greens negotiated some changes, including a floor of about half a billion dollars that
00:58needs to be spent every year, which might perhaps lead, interestingly, into this week
01:03in Parliament, where the government's pushing a very different set of legislation, its new
01:07shared equity scheme.
01:08This is that shared equity scheme, and it has a much less certain future in the Parliament
01:14this week.
01:15Now, this is about essentially trying to get first homebuyers into properties and people
01:20on lower incomes as well.
01:22The government would take a stake in a property with a homebuyer, up to 30 or 40 per cent.
01:29The idea is to try and reduce the deposit that's required for that home, and also mortgage
01:34repayments as well.
01:35Now, the government says these sorts of schemes are up and running and working well around
01:40various states and territories, and it wants to put in place a federal model.
01:45But at the moment, this bill is relatively friendless in the Parliament.
01:48The Coalition opposes it, saying the government has no business buying homes alongside people
01:53and there are other better ways to improve housing affordability for Australians.
01:58The Greens also oppose it as well, saying this is only going to drive demand in the
02:03housing sector and push up prices further.
02:07They do want to negotiate with the government, but the government seems to be of a mind not
02:11to do that, saying this bill should stand on its merits.
02:14Here's the Housing Minister, Clare O'Neill, speaking on this issue earlier today.
02:18Our government's trying to build.
02:21The Greens and the Liberals are trying to block, and we need them to stop doing it.
02:24We want nurses and early educators and paramedics to get into home ownership.
02:29This is going to be the only viable pathway for a lot of them, and I cannot believe that
02:33we've got political parties in this country that are going to stand in the path of these
02:36people who we owe so much getting into home ownership.
02:40The Greens say they are willing to talk about this bill.
02:43They are, in principle, opposed to it, but say if the government's willing to talk about
02:47things like negative gearing, capital gains tax or rent caps, it would be open to discussions
02:52of perhaps passing this bill.
02:54Here's the Greens Senator, David Shoebridge, speaking earlier.
02:58There is no credible modelling that says this will work.
03:02The Property Council independent expert says without significant amendment, it will just
03:07drive up house prices for the tiny fraction of houses that it's likely to deliver.
03:12A door is open, and we're ready to negotiate.
03:15So right now it appears the government is willing to lob this bill into the Senate,
03:19even with the prospect that it might fail, essentially setting up a political fight with
03:24both the Greens and the Coalition.
03:26For now, both those parties seem up for that brawl.