Page 3350 - Week 10 - Wednesday, 19 October 2022
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I welcome Senator Pocock’s advocacy around this issue. I particularly welcome his advocacy around this issue because, as he said in a Canberra Weekly article today:
Senator Gallagher may of course say the government won’t be doing any deals, but the fact remains that the government doesn’t have a majority in the Senate. I wouldn’t be doing the right thing by the people who elected me if I didn’t try everything possible to see this debt forgiven.
Right there, in black and white, from the mouth of Canberra’s newest senator is, in practice, the value of electing minority governments, power-sharing governments, and avoiding, at all cost, giving absolute power on any occasion to either one of the two old parties. I think Canberra has shown historically how that can work and how that can work well, and I am pleased to see a crossbench senator in the federal parliament flexing his muscles—pardon the pun—on this particular issue. I think this is a really important one to stake a flag in the ground on and say that it is really important.
In my position as a non-minister, I do have limited opportunity to present new ideas and fresh perspectives to this Assembly in the form of private member’s business. This important issue is why on 2 June I made the choice and I thought it was so important to talk about this historical public housing debt.
For those playing at home, this is literally the situation as I see it. For nine years, we had a federal coalition government that did not want to do anything about this debt. We saw two things: the Labor Party here in the ACT take the hit that was kind of obvious, because the federal coalition just would not pony up the dough and help us out; and a silent Canberra Liberal Party that had nothing to say on the issue for nine years.
Now we have a brand-new Albanese Labor government that has not done anything yet. This Assembly is obviously frustrated about it. So we have shades of defence coming from my Labor colleagues and we have absolute, apoplectic outrage coming from my Liberal colleagues. No outrage for the last nine years. This is not a new debt; it is just a new government, which shows that the Canberra Liberals continued new activism around this space is motivated purely by politics!
Mr Parton: Come on!
MR DAVIS: Mr Parton, I will share. I was very disappointed to hear Senator Gallagher’s comments and I am very disappointed to hear that the federal budget will not include the waiving of the ACT’s historic housing debt. It is my view, for what it is worth, and I think the view of most Australians watching this debate, that the fact is that we are in the middle of a housing crisis that most subnational governments have acknowledged, and we continue to have a piddling contest on debt between who owes it, the commonwealth government or states and territory governments. I think most Australians go: “It is all debt. It is all government. Figure it out and build more homes.”
I think that is where most people sit on this issue, rather than the constant, “You did not do it when you were in office, so you are bad” and “You have only been in office for a couple of weeks. Your business cards probably are not printed. You have not
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