Address to the Property Council of Australia’s National Housing Solutions Summit

Labor seems to lack genuine solutions to solve Australia’s housing supply crisis.

Less than 2 weeks from the Budget we are left wondering what Labor will actually do on housing, on red tape, on green tape, on most things. It's more of the same inaction from this government since mid-2022.

The only guarantee so far is more uncertainty and the likelihood of lower levels of housing completions.

Australia's housing crisis is real, it is worsening, and needs to be fixed.

What we lack is a credible policy response from Labor commensurate to this crisis.

Instead, Labor has given us gimmicks like the 5% scheme that pumps up prices for first home buyers and does nothing for the real problem - housing supply.

And Housing Australia, the agency created by Labor and entrusted with overseeing an $80 billion commitment, has been consumed by internal dysfunction rather than completing new homes.

We should talk about what is holding back supply, what Parliament is doing on accountability, and how our housing agenda is shaping up.

Economic Reform Roundtable inaction

Over 8 months since Labor’s economic ‘reform’ roundtable, we have not seen a meaningful reduction in red tape.

Australia, seemingly, remains closed for business.

The National Construction Code (NCC) still stands at some 2,350 pages. It remains a handbrake on supply.

It has gone from 200 to 2,000 pages since 1988 and our buildings aren’t that much better.

Back in August 2025, Treasurer Chalmers asked Housing Minister Clare O’Neil “to see where we can reduce complexity and red tape in the National Construction Code.” He said they’d “asked Clare to do that work relatively swiftly.”

A Treasury review was announced in December, facilitated by the Australian Building Codes Board. Consultation closed in February. We are now almost in May.

Results are still pending. We have little idea as to what will happen next.

Cutting back the National Construction Code

Last week’s Senate hearings into productivity and red tape in the housing sector, which I chaired, laid bare the Government’s failure.

Master Builders Australia warned that “construction industry productivity is a shadow of its former self.” In the higher density side of the market, they noted it takes some 33 months to build a new apartment, compared to 21 months a decade ago.

The NCC is layered with gold plating for unclear reasons. This has made new home building impractical and unaffordable for Australians on average incomes. Why should young Australians have to pay for mandatory grab rails in bathrooms?

Further, it was revealed at the Senate hearings that in O’Neil’s solitary meeting with the Building Codes Board, she did not ask for ways to cut costs for builders.

A 2025 preview of the NCC has been proposed to start from May 2026, but states are pulling back from its adoption, given concerns from industry.

The Urban Development Institute of Australia said at the hearings, for example, that one change in the 2025 NCC alone related to mechanical ventilation of apartment buildings adds up to $25,000 of costs per dwelling.

In other words: they promised to make it easier, but they are making it harder.

The Building Codes Board was also unable to answer simple questions on how much the incremental changes of the NCC have cost the economy and Australians over time.

If you can follow the logic, after the 2026 NCC Preview, they will apparently have a freeze of the code for four years - this is despite their parallel review of Modern Methods of Construction (MMC).

It seems if any good ideas come from the MMC review, they can’t be included in the NCC for four years.

You couldn’t make it up.

Labor has no plan to make the NCC better, apparently only to do no further harm.

The Senate Committee heard the ambition of the industry to get back to an NCC closer to the original 200 pages. This is seen to be achievable.

By focusing on the core standards necessary for safety as the basis. And adding anything else as optional. So a graduated NCC that delivers a basic cheap house for Australians should be considered.

I believe that if you want to build a cheap house, you should be allowed to build a cheap house.

Only in Australia would you find so much red tape as to make a cheap house illegal.

Streamlining the EPBC

Another promise at the Roundtable was to reform the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act (EPBC) to streamline housing approvals.

Chalmers asked Environment and Water Minister Murray Watt: “to accelerate the EPBC legislation... in line with the principles of the Samuel review: stronger standards, faster approvals, more transparency and integrity.”

But the results have not lived up to this.

Industry says that the new EPBC laws are just the beginning and the important details are in the related standards which are up to the Minister to decide.

At the recent Senate productivity hearings, after repeated questioning, we heard there are almost 100,000 houses stuck in the EPBC approvals processes – some dating back to 2017.

We have not even seen all the standards and no state bilateral agreements have been signed. We have more uncertainty than ever.

A Coalition Government would put in place a streamlined EPBC that delivers for the environment and for Australians. We would cut the complexity and size of the EPBC, while ensuring certainty for stakeholders and a focus on fast tracking approvals.

Making Housing Australia more accountable

Instead of building houses, Labor has built a housing bureaucracy to oversee its housing gimmicks: Housing Australia.

Housing Australia has been more distracted with its internal dysfunction and chaos than with building houses.

With a staff turnover of over 25 per cent in twelve months to August 2025, and four Work Health and Safety cases - it is clear that there are serious cultural and organisational issues plaguing the agency.

I have asked through the Senate process for documents relating to the results and findings of the two most recent staff surveys conducted in Housing Australia; as well as the rectification plan in response to these staff survey results.

This has repeatedly not been complied with by Labor. O'Neil’s office even asked me to remove this request. They are just embarrassed and running for cover.

Housing Australia is not just dysfunctional, it is making the housing crisis worse. When they try to build houses, they spend up to $1.2 million to build a single new dwelling, when the average cost of building a new house in Australia is closer to $500,000. Why should the taxpayer pay more than double for Labor’s houses?

It is also unclear how the latest and largest Housing Australia Future Fund (HAFF) Round 3 is going.

And how much money has been spent? It seems Labor’s HAFF started with $10 billion, has built only a handful of houses after over 2.5 years, and now has $11.4 billion with money sitting in the bank.

We also know that Housing Australia has spent at least $300 million since the 2025 election and they are mandated to spend at least $500 million each year from the HAFF - but greater transparency is needed.

We will engage with other Senators to ensure we get more transparency from the Housing Australia hellhole, following the passage of the Private Senators’ Bill on the powers of Housing Australia last session.

All of this has resulted in the Australian National Audit Office launching a year-long review into the design and delivery of the HAFF.

I pushed for this Audit in my correspondence with the Auditor-General. I welcome it because Australians deserve to know how scarce taxpayer funds are being spent.

Enabling greater Housing transparency

If we are to entrust agencies like Housing Australia with matters of national significance, the Parliament must be satisfied that the people appointed to lead these agencies are the best people for the job.

In the case of Housing Australia, it is a massive property developer, insurer and issuer of debt financing. It needs scrutiny.

We have a major problem in this country with the delegation of authority to Ministers. For example, Labor materially changed the 5% deposit scheme by stripping means testing and place caps, as well as extending eligibility to non-citizens - without any parliamentary oversight.

I strongly believe that there should be a pre-appointment vetting hearing in Parliament for the head of Housing Australia.

It would give the Parliament and the public a chance to assess whether an appointee understands their brief, is up to the task, and can effectively lead the agency.

This could help restore transparency and accountability by making clear that these appointments are positions of public trust, not internal promotions waved through behind closed doors, or dumping grounds for Labor's mates.

Addressing the housing supply failure

We desperately need to lift housing supply.

But the latest ABS data for the December 2025 quarter show Labor are almost 100,000 homes short of what’s needed to meet their own 1.2 million new homes target by mid-2029.

Labor is spending $80 billion to build 30,000 fewer houses each year, compared with the Coalition.

The Property Council of Australia says one of the key issues is that we are simply not turning building approvals into completions.

For example, they say current data shows that 75 per cent of apartments approved in Sydney since 2020 have not progressed to construction or reached completion.

Projects can be delayed for extended periods by red tape. By things like utility connections, engineering approvals and infrastructure sequencing.

While this is often a state issue, the Commonwealth has a role here. In terms of its incentive funding, and in holding the states and territories to account.

Higher taxes won’t build more houses

We have all heard about Labor’s touted housing taxes in the upcoming Budget.

But you cannot tax your way out of a housing supply shortage.

One of the biggest problems with their approach is that it is going to scare investors away when we desperately need more investment in housing.

Labor’s logic appears to be that it is a good thing to reduce investment by Australians in housing but simultaneously promote institutional investment.

Build to Rent, playing with ASIC Regulatory Guide 97, and the HAFF have all been geared to help institutional investors become big landlords. Now we see another plank emerging to replace mum and dads with institutions.

Who really knows how many scenarios they’ve asked the Treasury to dream up.

This is the same Treasury who said tinkering with CGT, etc. won’t fix the housing supply crisis.

Knowing it won’t raise much revenue as investors shift their behaviour, Labor are further looking at more drastic, retrospective tax changes. This is bad tax practice, it breaks the principle of policy certainty and creates sovereign risk.

Labor similarly announced a retrospective CGT dating back 20 years to 2006, that industry say could discourage future investment in Australia.

Modelling by the housing industry of various scenarios says changes to the CGT and negative gearing will result in a collapse of housing construction supply by up to 46,000 dwelling starts, reduce GDP by more than $3 billion, and lead to more than 4,000 job losses in the construction industry.

Increasing CGT would further entrench Australia’s uncompetitive tax settings. The ANU’s Tax and Transfer Policy Institute has pointed out that rental income from investment property is the most highly taxed savings vehicle in our system.

Investment property is subject to personal income tax on rental income, capital gains, land taxes, and stamp duty.

For high income earners, the marginal effective tax rate on rental income is just under 100 per cent.

And the housing industry further warns that around $200,000 is raised in direct tax imposts alone from each new house — even more in some markets.

It is completely irresponsible to lift any taxes on housing in the midst of a housing crisis. It doesn’t matter if it’s for new or old housing.

If the government plays with these taxes it will be bad for the country. Because fewer houses will be constructed as a result. And it will reduce investor confidence.

But politically it will lead Labor down a dangerous path: they will have to declare their tax plan is going to fix the housing crisis.

The Prime Minister and the Treasurer will have to say that their new housing taxes will fix the nation’s housing crisis or make it materially better.

But we know that it won’t. This will haunt the government.

Increase taxes at your own risk.

Our plan

We need to build our way out of the housing crisis.

We need to deliver this through lower taxes, better quality spending, less red and green tape - all geared towards building more homes for Australians.

We believe in builders, tradies and developers. We believe that individuals and markets will always triumph over government.

We are determined to ensure that all Australians can experience the dream of owning their own home.

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