Over the last 10 years, housing supply has increased faster than the population, but house prices have still risen聽75%. Peter Boyle聽looks at why Labor does not want the public to understand its tax concessions for the rich.
housing affordability crisis
Four million low-cost homes were delivered to Venezuelan citizens in April last year as part of a national social housing program, despite聽 attempts by the United States to cripple the country's economy, reports Jim McIlroy.
A new report by Anglicare Australia has revealed that less than 1% of private rentals are affordable for a person working full-time on the minimum wage and just four rentals across Australia are affordable for people on JobSeeker. Isaac Nellist reports.
Activists gathered outside Homes Victoria to demand an end to the privatisation of housing and for more public housing to be built.聽Isaac Nellist聽reports.
Sue Bolton, Merri-bek Socialist Alliance councillor and Victorian election candidate,聽is calling for an聽鈥榚mpty property tax鈥 聽to force landlords to stop land banking. Darren Saffin reports.
In a dawn raid on May 4, about 20 police descended on protesters, who had set up tents on the lawn in front of Hobart鈥檚 Parliament House to protest the state government鈥檚 lack of response to Hobart鈥檚 housing crisis, and ordered them to move on.
Chairperson of the Australian Prudential Regulatory Authority (APRA) Wayne Byres recently said that he would not use the to describe the housing market, preferring instead to use 鈥渉eightened risk鈥 rather than housing bubble.
The federal treasurer鈥檚 鈥渟olution鈥 to the housing affordability crisis is to get state governments to relax restrictions on housing developers to increase supply.
Scott Morrison told the industry鈥檚 peak body, the Urban Development Institute, on October 24 that 鈥渉ousing in Australia, especially in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane, is expensive and increasingly unaffordable, but that does not mean it is overvalued.鈥
How can you have more affordable housing and keep prices up at the same time?
The answer is you can鈥檛 do both.
Australia's largest cities are urban planning disaster zones.
Two facts in particular bear this out. First is the ongoing housing affordability crisis, which shows no sign of abating. Second is the relentless march of car-dependent urban sprawl, which continues to devour remnant native vegetation and good farming land. You get an eyeful of this latter problem as you approach Perth by plane, by some accounts the second-biggest metropolis in the world by surface area.