Page 4307 - Week 13 - Thursday, 4 December 2014
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In respect of those Mr Fluffy home owners who do engage in the scheme and then come back to their properties to buy, I say to the government that, for those individuals, if they owned that property then they should not have to pay the price that includes the uplift. They should be allowed to buy that land, assuming there was no subdivision or unit titling, so they can buy it back at a fair price. They should not then have a home that is able to be subdivided or unit titled. These people are not looking to make a profit. These are not profiteers. They are just people that want to stay on their property. And that would be fair.
There are many other issues that I will go to as well. One that is of significant concern is the fixed point for the valuation—28 October. People have been told that their land is valued as at 28 October. We have spoken to many individuals who have been to auctions and who have been trying to buy houses. We heard from Mr Ron Bell of the Real Estate Institute at the inquiry. He said that what is happening is that we now have several hundred Mr Fluffy home owners who are desperate, who will have money in their pockets and who are looking to buy a home. What we know is that the market is escalating, that the home that was going for $550,000 a couple of months ago is now up to $650,000 and so on.
So these people have been given a price, and it is a fair valuation for 28 October. But it is not a fair valuation if you are trying to buy in a market that is now affected by hundreds of home owners trying to buy a house in desperation. On a basic reading of economics, supply and demand, we understand that equation. So I call on the government to review that inflexibility in this scheme.
We have also heard from many elderly people who want to stay on in their home. They have been there for years and years and years. They want to stay there. If they have not contracted a disease from asbestos by now, they are probably not going to. Even if they do, Madam Speaker, as tragic as that is, moving out of their home that they have been in, they have raised their families in, will be just as bad. They are saying, “Let us stay.” I say to the government, “Have the flexibility in this scheme to let those people stay.”
There are also other people whose houses are not greatly affected. The living areas have been checked and there is no sign of loose-fill asbestos. They accept that eventually their houses will need to be demolished. But for those people, allow flexibility and let them stay. Do not make it a one size fits all, that they have got to go through a whole program that is not appropriate for their house and leave their house immediately. Let us say to those people, “We have an individually tailored asbestos management plan so you can stay on in the medium term,” because we do not want everybody in the market straight away.
As raised in the report, there is also the issue of stamp duty. Although it says in the government’s plan that there is a waiver, what we have been told is that it is not a waiver. It is a refund. For many of these home owners, in financial crisis as they are, if they are going on to the market and they are being told, “You have got to find the extra $50,000, $60,000—however much it is,” they are also being told, “You have to find stamp duty.” So let us make it a genuine waiver rather than a refund. It is a small thing but it would help. I ask members to have a look at recommendation 9 from the committee’s report.
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