Thank you very much for inviting me here to speak today.

Housing has been one of my top priorities since first announcing I was running for the Senate. 

It’s one of the things Canberrans, and Australians generally, raise the most with me.

Because we know that housing is a human right, but too often we don’t treat it like one in our policy making.

It’s also not just any human right.

It’s an enabler of other fundamental human rights.

Access to secure, affordable housing enables the right to health, the right to education and economic opportunity. 

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We all know the challenges.

Housing in this country has become unaffordable.

Wages increases haven’t even come close to keeping pace with the increase in house prices and rent. 

This means a growing number of Australians are being locked out of home ownership and more and more people are living in housing stress.

Waitlists for public, social and affordable housing are huge and growing.

And with interest rates set to rise again, many of these challenges will be compounded.

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This is obviously not one problem with one cause.

Housing is a system. Land, tax, finance, construction, infrastructure and population all interact.

And now we have a tidal wave of data-centre investment that will compete for some of the same skilled workers we desperately need to build homes.

That means we have to stop looking for silver bullets.

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Politically we’ve seen some try and blame a lack of affordable housing placed solely at the feet of immigrants - untrue and unhelpful but an easy message to sell when people are being crushed by our housing and economic system.

But migration has to be part of this conversation.

We must be able to have a sensible, facts-based discussion about population, skills, infrastructure, housing and the impact on the environment.

How big do we want our country to become?

What infrastructure do we need? What do growing cities impact our incredible environment.

And how do we make sure housing supply keeps pace?

What isn't helpful is pretending migrants themselves are responsible for a housing system governments have failed to plan properly.

I previously tried to establish a Senate inquiry to have that broader discussion.

Because difficult questions deserve serious examination. Unfortunately we seem to have been caught in a place where major parties would rather fight over numbers rather than developing a plan for the next decade or two. 

Instead of a plan we have seen all manner of ideas floated - none more often than tapping superannuation. 

I understand why people want easier access to money when home ownership feels completely out of reach.

But giving buyers more money to compete for the same homes doesn't fix the underlying problem.

We have to fix what is driving housing costs—not simply help people bid more for the same housing.

We need to deal with root causes.

And we need policy that lasts longer than one electoral cycle.

That's why Australia needs a long-term plan for housing.

I’m fairly new to politics and I’ve found it mind boggling that we don’t have a national plan for housing. How do you deal with a complex issue without a plan?

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It’s why in 2024 I introduced a bill that would require the Commonwealth Government to legislate a ten-year national housing and homelessness plan.

Seems like common sense to me but the government has resisted.

Housing policy is an area where we need innovation - where we need not one solution but many. 

Cooperative housing can and should be part of that mix. We’ve had it at a very small scale in Canberra for a long time and now we’ve got a larger scale demonstration project trying to get off the ground.

This has huge potential.

We should acknowledge the work the government has done over the last few years.

The Housing Australia Future Fund is welcome but clearly needs to be bigger and won’t solve everything.

The National Rental Affordability Scheme formally ended in June this year. There’s been nothing to replace it and in Canberra we’ve had about as many NRAS properties exit the system as HAFF builds committed. 

The changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax as they apply to residential property are significant and welcome reforms. For too long we have treated housing as an investment vehicle, an asset class for wealth creation, rather than something we want to be accessible and affordable for aussies. 

So we’ve made some progress but clearly there is so much more to do.

So I’m putting forward two more ideas.

The first is simple:

Public land, for public good.

My Commonwealth Land Bill would require Commonwealth land sold for housing to include at least 30 per cent social and affordable housing.

Defence is preparing to divest land with an estimated value of around $3 billion.

That creates an opportunity.

You can't make bricks cheaper.

But government can decide what happens to public land.

If land owned by all of us is being turned into housing, some of those homes should remain affordable to ordinary Australians.

Public land, for public good.

We had a perfect example in Canberra recently where the Commonwealth Government sold half a site to the ACT Government for housing but only 15% will be affordable. 

450 homes instead of 900 when we have a waiting list of more than 3,600.

The second idea is about keeping people in their homes and builds on an idea from the University of Canberra’s Dr Chris Wallace.

Cost of living is cooked.

Fuel.

Groceries.

Mortgages.

And with interest rates already putting enormous pressure on households, many people simply don't have room in their budget for another shock.

The next RBA decision is only days away.

Many Australians don’t have any room left in their budget to absorb another rate hike.

I think the government needs to be prepared to step in and assist people in acute mortgage stress.

Not by raiding their super.

But by stepping in to take an equity stake to get them through a tough time.

The government already does this for first home buyers through their Help to Buy Scheme.

The HomeKeeper Scheme I'm developing would allow government to take a temporary equity stake in appropriate cases.

Because helping someone through a temporary crisis can be far better—for them, for government and for the community—than waiting until they lose their home and trying to pick up the pieces afterwards.

These are just two ideas. There are obviously so many more.

Because we need to be both helping people who need housing now and fixing the system for the long term.

That means more supply. More social and affordable housing. Better use of public land.

Different models of ownership and rental.

Tax settings that support housing rather than speculation.

And a national plan that survives electoral cycles.

If we're serious about treating housing as a human right, that's the work ahead of us.