Andrew Clennell:
Well, joining me live is the Housing Minister, Clare O’Neil. Clare O’Neil, thanks for your time. You heard the Opposition Leader there say that they’ve driven the policy agenda in recent times. Isn’t that the case with this foreign buyer announcement you’ve made this morning which mirrors their policy?
Clare O’Neil:
Well, it’s absolutely not the case, Andrew. And if I could just – before we get to foreign buyers, if I can just say what a terrible missed opportunity for Peter Dutton. That was a really long form, quality interview with you where he had an opportunity to tell you specifically what it is he plans to do if he’s Prime Minister of this country. Doesn’t even have a simple answer to things like what he wants to do about the cost of living, without question the biggest issue facing the country. So, I think it’s really sad that we’re about to enter an election period here and we’ve got an Opposition that seems to think it’s going to coast into government without producing a single properly costed good policy for our country.
Clennell:
Well, he suggested he’s going to look at the budget and then look at tax cuts.
O’Neil:
Well, I mean, don’t you think we need a bit more than suggestions, Andrew? I mean, we’re about to have an election here. What has the Coalition been doing for the last 3 years? They should have been doing the hard work, doing proper media interviews like the one you just did there, and coming up with good policies that are going to support Australians with the really significant issues that they’re facing in their lives right now. Instead, what we’ve got is a bunch of rhetoric that’s just thrown around and evidently a view that, you know, they can get into the campaign without producing a single costed policy. No one would tolerate that from the Labor Party and you shouldn’t tolerate it for the Liberal Party.
Clennell:
Well, you’re on the front foot, Clare O’Neil. Let me try and put you on the back foot just a little. I mean, you basically ripped off the Opposition’s policy here and it only relates to about 0.38 per cent of the market. So, it’s clearly a political decision, isn’t it?
O’Neil:
Well, let me take you through what the policy is all about, Andrew. Today the government’s announcing that we are going to ban foreign ownership of existing property in Australia. This is an important move. It’s not a silver bullet to the housing crisis because there is no silver bullet. But I really firmly believe that given the housing pressures that Australians are facing today, we need to orient the entire efforts of the Australian Government around security of housing for Australians and, wherever possible, home ownership for a broader range of young Australians. This is a good policy. And Andrew, I just want you to understand this is part of a hugely bold and ambitious housing agenda that our government is implementing at the moment. $32 billion to build more homes in our country, assist renters with the pressures they’re facing and get more Australians into home ownership.
Clennell:
But you’ve ripped off his policy. Why can’t you just say, look, when the Opposition’s got a good idea, we’ll take it up. But we have all these other ideas. Why can’t you admit it’s their policy?
O’Neil:
We’ve been looking at this for a while now and you can make the political commentary, that’s part of your job as a political commentator. I’m a politician and my job is to make good public policy for the country. I do think this is good public policy and that’s why the government is announcing it today.
Clennell:
Do you accept you’re a long way off achieving the government’s target for new homes? The Master Builders Association and Property Council say 300 to 400,000 off a target of building 1.2 million new homes in 5 years.
O’Neil:
So, Andrew, what you’re talking about there is the government’s drive to build our way out of the current housing crisis. If there’s one single reason why we have significant housing pressures being faced around the country, it’s because we’ve gone through a period of about 30 years now where Australian Governments at every level have not done enough to make sure that we’re building enough homes for Australians. So, the core of our policy is build, build, build. And we’re doing that through funding additional homes. We’re doing it through training, more tradies, we’re doing it through pushing the states to undertake planning reforms and other measures. So, this is a big and complex task. What the Prime Minister has done is sat down with the premiers and leaders across the states and territories and said that we’re going to set a national target of trying to build 1.2 million home homes over a 5 year period.
You’re right, we do need to lift our construction numbers in order to meet that target. But what I would say is we need a galvanising goal to get the country engaged in this. What the Coalition has said, after 9 years of doing absolutely nothing about this problem, 3 years of opposing all of our measures to try to address it, is that they are actually going to scrap a building target for the nation altogether and essentially go back to that retreated position where the Commonwealth has nothing to do with housing that’s what we saw for 9 years under the Coalition. We have a different view. We’re going to be gutsy. We’re going to set big, bold targets for the country because big, bold initiatives is the only way that we’re going to get out of this mess that’s been created.
Clennell:
Has Peter Dutton got a point, though, when he says you’ve let – or his figure is 2 million people into the country and that hasn’t helped? You know, we’ve had record net migration.
O’Neil:
Well, we’ve had record net migration because you’ll remember that the borders were shut for 2 years while COVID had them closed, and people arrived after COVID. People who would have come during that preceding 2 years arrived in those years that followed. What I would say is that we arrived in office to find a migration system that was fundamentally broken. And I use those words fundamentally broken carefully because they are the words of Martin Parkinson, who conducted a landmark review when we came to office. He also told us that that migration system was broken, and I’m quoting again here, because of a decade of wilful neglect.
I want people to remember that while Peter Dutton was Home Affairs Minister, he actually issued more visas in a single year than any other politician in Australian history. Ten million visas in one year. So, we’re taking the necessary measures to bring migration back to normal and in addition, fix the systems aspects of it that are broken. The big thing we need to do, though, just setting aside migration, is that we have to build more homes. I don’t think anyone is disputing that. The only people with a pathway and a plan to do it are the Labor Party, the Liberals are saying they’re not even going to try this. They’re actually going to scrap the target.
Clennell:
The Opposition spokesman, Michael Sukkar, accused you in the House last week of not having built a single home out of the $10 billion Housing Australia Future Fund so far. Is that true?
O’Neil:
Well, we’ve been in government for 3 years and about half a million homes have been built across the country in that time, more than 10,000 of those have been built because of government policy. And if you want to watch my social media, Andrew, you’ll see that several times a week I’m turning sods, I’m giving keys to tenants, or I’m standing on top of a building which is completely new housing.
Clennell:
Any built because of the fund? Any built because of the fund thus far?
O’Neil:
Thus far with the Housing Australia Future Fund, we have tenants in homes as part of that fund. But I think if Michael Sukkar is coming forward and critiquing that fund for being slow in delivery, we’ve got to just take a breath at the hypocrisy of that. The reason that this fund was delayed was because of the Liberals. The Liberals teamed up with the Greens, as they have in so many other policies here, and effectively delayed that fund by a year in doing so, delayed the construction of homes, sent more people into homelessness, took housing away from veterans who could have been using it, and they need to be accountable for that. Now, thank God that fund is up and running. I announced 13,700 new homes that will be constructed in September last year. That’s round one of the Housing Australia Future Fund. That’s more homes than the Coalition constructed in their entire decade in office. So, let’s just take a breath here. We have a commitment and funding to fund 55,000 social and affordable homes across the country, many multiples of what the Coalition funded and built in their 9 years.
Clennell:
Ok, just briefly, Peter Dutton says he won’t support an extension of the power bill subsidy. What did you make of that?
O’Neil:
Look, again, I mean, the hypocrisy in all of this just knows no bounds. We’ve had Peter Dutton roaming up and down the country, getting upset about what he says is his concern about power prices, but then coming into the parliament and voting against energy bill price relief that our government put in place. And unfortunately, it’s not just with energy bill relief, Andrew. We’ve seen that with the cheaper medicines policy that the government’s put in place, with the cheaper childcare policy. We even saw that initial strong resistance to our government giving a tax cut to every Australian taxpayer that Peter Dutton said he wanted to have an election about. He felt so strongly against the proposal. So, we’ve had a government here for 3 years during a difficult time for Australians. Through the cost of living, every opportunity, we’re finding ways to try to provide assistance to people. And in almost every instance, Peter Dutton has stood in our path.
Clennell:
Michael Pezzullo, he says he might have him back. You sacked him. What do you think of that?
O’Neil:
Well, I have a lot of respect, actually, for Michael Pezzullo. Peter Dutton can make those comments. I don’t really have a comment on it.
Clennell:
Sounds like Mr Dutton would keep Kevin Rudd as Ambassador to the US if he found he was doing a good enough job. That was the qualification. What did you make of that?
O’Neil:
Look, I’m pleased to see, you know that there’s some element of bipartisanship here, because the truth is that there is not a single person on the planet that I would have as Australian Ambassador to Washington than Kevin Rudd. Kevin Rudd is a global expert in relations regarding China, which is of course one of the most important issues that we confront and will continue to confront. He is one of the most assiduous, hard working, diligent patriots of our country and he’s doing a fantastic job. And you’ve seen that too in the last couple of weeks while we’ve been managing that challenging issue with regard to the tariffs proposed by the US, so, I’m pleased to see Peter Dutton make those qualification remarks.
Clennell:
Now, Peter Dutton, last week or so has called for a major independent inquiry into this incident in Sydney involving this caravan full of explosives being found with a list of addresses in it and apparent preparation for antisemitic attacks. There was a report in the Nine newspapers over the weekend, an apparent police leak that suggested this was this caravan was some kind of hoax, that criminals had loaded up the caravan full of very old explosives as part of an attempt for a plea bargain. What can you tell us about this?
O’Neil:
Look, Andrew, I’m not going to elaborate on the investigation because it is totally inappropriate for politicians to run a running commentary on an active police investigation. What I think this does speak to is just the complete irresponsibility of the way that Peter Dutton has conducted himself over the last few with regard to this. I mean, clearly without full information, he’s actually jumped on social media and made a number of inflammatory remarks about his particular interpretation of this in order to, I think, play politics with it. I think it’s really irresponsible and rash and it is not conduct befitting a national leader and I certainly wouldn’t engage in it.
Clennell:
Clare O’Neil, very briefly, because we’re out of time, do you expect an interest rate cut this week?
O’Neil:
Look, I don’t want to make any predictions, but what I will say is that the government now for 3 years has been doing every single thing possible to make sure that we provide cost‑of‑living relief to Australians without creating inflationary effects. And you’ve seen that through all of those significant policies that have helped people while we’ve delivered 2 budget surpluses, created a million jobs and seen inflation go from, you know, having a 6 in front of it to at the lower band of what the Reserve Bank expects. So, I’m hopeful, but I won’t say any more than that at this stage.
Clennell:
Clare O’Neil, thanks so much for your time.
O’Neil:
Thanks, Andrew.