Albanese's $10bn pledge pushes housing needs back into the limelight
- Written by Hal Pawson, Professor of Housing Research and Policy, and Associate Director, City Futures Research Centre, UNSW
Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese’s budget reply speech last night highlighted Australia’s huge unnmet need for social and affordable housing. It’s once again shaping up as a major election issue. Labor is proposing a A$10 billion program to build 30,000 social and affordable homes over five years.
The immediate backdrop for the pledge is a post-COVID house price boom, and a continuing dearth of Commonwealth investment in new non-market housing. That is, rentals affordable to low-income Australians and provided by government agencies or non-profit community housing organisations.
Amid the many new spending plans revealed in Tuesday’s budget, Treasurer Josh Frydenberg maintained the government’s resistance to an ever-wider coalition of voices calling for social housing stimulus.
Read more: Why more housing stimulus will be needed to sustain recovery
Authors: Hal Pawson, Professor of Housing Research and Policy, and Associate Director, City Futures Research Centre, UNSW