Page 2476 - Week 08 - Thursday, 30 August 2007
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really have just brought forward consumption, rather than actually addressing some of the key issues in relation to housing affordability, so it is important to have a supply-side response.
Later in that hearing the minister went on to say:
If we continue to undersupply the market, even if we do reserve 10 or 15 per cent, we are not going to address the issue ...
The government is now proposing to ensure that ACTPLA has a ready supply of land. The minister proposes to have ACTPLA hold a ready supply of five years worth of land. It is also important to note that there is an inherent conflict between the objective of lowering, or at least avoiding, massive increases in the price of new houses and the desire of existing home owners to preserve and increase the capital value of their homes. I am particularly concerned that we do not repeat the mistakes of the Follett government on this issue: flooding the market suddenly with land and completely eroding the capital worth of people in the ACT and their single largest investment, the family home. We need to walk very carefully here. I am pleased that we do have an economic rationalist at the moment in the role of planning, so there is hope that some sanity will prevail in the handling of this area of policy.
As I said at the commencement of my remarks, there is no easy solution to this conflict and it is the reason that a range of strategies may be needed to address housing affordability. (Second speaking period taken.) We cannot just treat land release as a quick fix. While we are now seeing some proposals for land release, I note that the housing affordability problem has not occurred overnight. It has come about slowly, through a number of problems in government, including its slow release land monopoly, its increasing levels of taxation on the property sector and its cumbersome process for planning and approvals.
In estimates committee hearings on 21 June, the Chief Planning Executive of ACTPLA set out the commitments of the national action framework for affordable housing. He stated:
The four commitment areas cover issues of taxation as one commitment; in other words, looking at national reform on taxation issues and revenue issues.
While I commend the Chief Planning Executive on his commitment to the issue of taxation reform, I note that this position is starkly at odds with the attitude of the Chief Minister, who has ruled out any review of the punitive levels of ACT taxation. Yesterday the Chief Minister denied that he had ruled it out. I draw Mr Barr’s attention to a press release—I was going to table it yesterday; I will do that later—that the minister put out on the day that he released the June accounts, where he ruled out tax relief and spoke about being responsible in not doing these things. We will bring that later to the attention of the Assembly because it runs completely contrary to the retreat we heard yesterday.
Mr Barr: For this financial year, but he said that we review it every year.
MR MULCAHY: That message is starting to cut through. The public are saying, “Fair comment, Mr Mulcahy. We bring an extra $100 million and we do not see any
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