KIM BOMFORD:
Welcome, everybody. Thank you for coming here today. Firstly, I'd just like to welcome Minister Julie Collins, our federal minister, and also our Managing Director of Housing Choices Australia Michael Lennon, who's come across from Melbourne to join us today. And we also have Nathan Dal Bon, who's head of the NHFIC, which is the National Housing Finance and Investment Corporation, and which is one of the main reasons we're here today to talk about the great work that they're doing as well. Before we progress any further, I just like to take the opportunity to acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which we stand today, our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Elders, emerging – past, present and emerging, sorry ‑ and just recognising that they are, as I say, the original owners of the country in which we're standing and a very important time in which to think about the contribution that our Indigenous people have made to this country, both previously and into the future. On that note, I would like to hand over to the Minister, Julie Collins, who’ll talk a bit about the work that she's doing. Thanks.
JULIE COLLINS:
Thanks, Kim. It's terrific to be here, and to be with Kim and to have Michael with us. Michael, if you're not aware, is nationally actually the Deputy Chair of our new Supply and Affordability Council that we've just established. It's in an interim stage, and we're hoping to introduce legislation in the next week or so into the federal parliament to make it a statutory authority over the long term. And of course, Nathan from our National Housing Finance and Investment Corporation, which is soon going to become Housing Australia. There will be legislation in the federal parliament to create Housing Australia. What we're doing here, here in Burnie, is of course announcing a partnership. This is a partnership between the Tasmanian Government, community housing provider Housing Choices and the federal government. And it's about getting more homes on the ground more quickly here and adding to what was already a smaller project. We're talking about here up to 181 new homes on the northwest coast of Tasmania ‑ 18 here on this site. This is a very significant investment ‑ $33 million in loans and in grants to Housing Choices to allow these constructions to occur in partnership with the state government and Housing Choices.
This is, of course, just the start of what we're talking about when it comes to the federal government's agenda. What we want to see more of is working in a way with community housing providers and, of course, with other tiers of government to get more homes on the ground more quickly, and to leverage things that are happening and to scale them up. I mean, it is a very significant investment ‑ up to 181 homes, new homes here on the northwest coast of Tasmania. And I look forward to making more announcements, like I have been in recent weeks and months, as we've unlocked up to $575 million immediately and whilst we have our legislation going into the federal parliament in the coming weeks to establish the Housing Australia Future Fund. This is a fund that will be $10 billion. Each and every year, the investment returns from this fund will be invested into social and affordable homes right across the country. And it will be in partnership, as I've said, with other tiers of government and with community housing providers. What we want to do as a federal government is work with other tiers of government, work with community housing providers, the construction sector and the industry to get more homes on the ground more quickly. And we're also having ‑ and I know that NHFIC, which will become Housing Australia, is also talking to superannuation funds about institutional investments so that we can leverage even more. We have a fundamental supply problem in Australia. We don't have enough homes. We need to build more and we need to build them sooner, and I'm looking forward to getting on with the job. This is a great announcement today here on the northwest coast, up to 181 new homes. And I'll hand over to Michael to say a few words.
MICHAEL LENNON:
Well thank you, Minister, and thank you, everyone for coming along today. I would like to acknowledge some of our partners today. John Ross from NHFIC, as well as CEO Nathan Dal Bon. But in addition, we also have our building and design contractors here today, who are a vital part of the delivery of this supply. But I would want to say on behalf of Housing Choices how excited and thrilled we are in the community housing sector that the federal government has accepted responsibility and taken such strong initiatives to deal with a fundamental problem in Australia. As Paul Keating said, how did we get to a point where a nation like Australia couldn't house its own people? Because that's where we've got to. So we have a government that has promised up to 40,000 dwellings over the next five years, and has invested funds in order to deliver that. But this is not a Commonwealth problem on its own. State and territory governments have historically had the responsibility here, and the Commonwealth has set a different tone by working through an accord with state and territory governments, the community housing sector, and local government, because all of these problems end up in a street, in a neighbourhood and with a family. They’re inherently local.
When we started 12 years ago in Tasmania, the public housing system here was in a crisis in every sense. At that stage, a very brave step was taken to expand the role of not for profit regulated organisations like Housing Choices. At the end of this program, we will have almost two and a half thousand dwellings in Tasmania. We've got a pipeline of work in three different locations here, which is providing work for trades, for subcontractors, for building companies, for all the associated professionals, but most importantly, is providing stable, affordable homes for families and for their children, in order that they can dwell, prosper and expand their horizons in these communities. We are delighted to be part of this new partnership with government. In this circumstance, NHFIC ‑ the National Housing Finance and Investment Corporation ‑ plays a critical role in delivering affordable finance to organisations like Housing Choices, by aggregating and combining our debt and getting it substantially cheaper than we would through the private banks. In doing so we're able to take long term debt, blended with other monies, and create these kinds of outcomes.
So Minister, we're thrilled and excited. We already have a track record, but this 181 is material for this part of the country and we expect to be here regularly, frequently over the coming years. We're excited, thrilled, but the people who will live in these dwellings are the people who we most care about. Thank you for your time today.
COLLINS:
Questions?
JOURNALIST:
So the 181 homes. What kind of timeline is that?
COLLINS:
Well, obviously, you can see homes are under construction here now. They'll be built over the next few years. I'm happy for Michael to answer the specific details, but I understand that we'll be getting people into homes as soon as in the next couple of months. What we want to do is get as many homes on the ground as quickly as we can. But they, of course, need to be the right homes in the right places. The beauty of where we are today in this spot is, of course, there is an education institution just up the road. What we need to do is make sure that these homes are in the right places, and are the right types of homes. And that's what we're doing, as Michael indicated with the National Housing Accord, which we're working with the other tiers of government. That's what we're trying to do with our investment in the Housing Australia Future Fund, through Housing Australia. We want to get more homes on the ground. We want to work with providers, work with state governments, work with local government so that we can leverage as much as we can to get as many homes on the ground as possible.
JOURNALIST:
How important is it to get that ball rolling early, so we wouldn't be in a situation again in the future where we find it hard to house people, especially [inaudible]?
COLLINS:
Well, what we've seen over the last decade, of course, is a federal government missing in action when it comes to housing. What we now have is a federal government that had taken commitments to the last election that we're implementing. We're implementing them when it comes to the Supply and Affordability Council. As I said, Michael here is the deputy chair of the interim council, getting it up and running to provide independent strategic advice to Housing Australia, to the federal government, to state governments about what is required to make sure we can get more homes on the ground more quickly. We've got a $10 billion fund with returns there in perpetuity, to provide for social and affordable housing across the country. Recognising that all of that takes some time, we've immediately made up to $575 million available while we work on the Accord and a National Housing and Homelessness Plan. And of course working with Housing Australia, which will be the new entity, to get those homes on the ground as quickly as we can.
LENNON:
Before we finish, we might just give Chief Executive Nathan Dal Bon the opportunity to say a few words about the Corporation and its role in this project.
NATHAN DAL BON:
Thanks, Michael. I think you've already explained what NHFIC does. Look, it's just a real privilege for me to come to Burnie today. It's the first time I've been to this part of Tasmania and step out of the office and actually see firsthand what our finance is providing. We're a Commonwealth organisation. Our role is essentially to provide, as Michael said, long term cheap finance and to fill a gap in the market which is not currently fulfilled. To give you a sense of this particular project and the other deals that we're funding in Tasmania, we're looking at almost $90 million in financing that we've provided across Tasmania, supporting 660 homes, and we estimate that will save the community housing providers $15 million to reinvest in more social and affordable housing. So we're really proud to work with community housing providers, all levels of government to make sure that these projects are delivered and delivered on time. Thanks very much.
LENNON:
Just an answer to the question about the pipeline, it does take a while for these things to get going. But these 18 will be finished within a matter of weeks or months, by the middle of the year. The 181 will be produced by the end of December. The Minister, the federal agencies will be putting pipelines of funding in place, which for the first time will see a steady stream of expanded supply over a number of years. We haven't had that in a generation. So this is the beginning of a very exciting change, and one that will have material benefits for all Tasmanians.
JOURNALIST:
I just was going to ask you a question because we asked a similar question a couple of weeks ago, but it was more so, like what ‑ how is the per centage of the homes divided? Like we talked about how elderly women with you know, maybe a disability as some of the people who are most in need at the moment. How are these houses going to be divided?
BOMFORD:
If I can talk to that, Michael. So as we know, we've got in Tasmania, sadly, you know, over four and a half thousand families and singles on the wait list. And that's one of those strong tools that we as organisations, but also Homes Tasmania use in trying to determine where the most need is. So from that information, and it's just one of one of the tools, but within that information not only do we get an idea of where demand is generally across the state, but we also get that breakdown of information within those priority applicants about their specific needs. So whether they do have mobility needs, whether they do have additional support needs, whether they're coming from homelessness specifically to people who are at risk of homelessness, you know, through their circumstances. So we get a lot of need information from that particular tool. And that's how we sort of start to consider where we're going to actually deliver our houses. Land is a driver as well. So you know, in our current market there is a bit of a dearth of available land for development such as what we want to do. So the more we can sort of identify, you know, good quality, well located land at a decent price that enables affordable delivery, the better off we are in the market as well.
LENNON:
The important thing in this debate is not simply to build houses where you’ve got chronic housing need at the moment. These buildings should last 60 and 80 years. So we have to think about access to services, access to schools, employment, training ‑ all of those things. So when you make these investments, you're also investing in the economy, in the community of the Northwest. The Minister indicated that our national housing supply council had been established, and I'm very privileged to be part of this. We have no method in Australia at the present time for planning out housing demand and housing supply. And it's astonishing. It's astonishing that an advanced country in Australia operates in this sense on an annual cycle. What the government is saying is that housing is basic infrastructure, needs to be thought about that in the same way we think about pipes and wires and poles and electricity and gas and all of those things. It’s a necessary part of our economy, and the method that's been put in place by the Commonwealth Minister is not only about the planning, it's about the funding and delivery with other tiers of government. So this is a seismic change in the way in which we think about a very deep seated problem.