Michael Sukkar MP

Interview with Pete Stefanovic – Sky News Australia

THE HON MICHAEL SUKKAR MP – SHADOW MINISTER FOR SOCIAL SERVICES, NDIS, HOUSING AND HOMELESSNESS

TRANSCRIPT

INTERVIEW WITH PETE STEFANOVIC – SKY NEWS AUSTRALIA

Thursday 19 September, 2024

TOPICS: Housing, Childcare

E&OE

Pete Stefanovic: Prime Minister will be in Cairns this morning where he’ll appear alongside the Queensland Premier, Steven Miles, at the site of the state’s biggest ever social housing project that will hopefully, ultimately deliver up to 490 affordable homes. Joining us live now is the shadow Housing Minister, Michael Sukkar. Michael, thanks for your time as always this morning.
So, the PM still on his big housing sell, but you’re not swayed?

Michael Sukkar: Oh, look, the prime minister is falling over himself, trying now to, after two and a half years of shocking housing outcomes, trying to create an impression that they’ve done anything other than make the housing crisis worse. We’ve seen under Anthony Albanese’s leadership fewer homes being built, 40 per cent fewer homes being built. We see fewer first home buyers, we see less housing approvals, which is really worrying and that means that housing is just going to get worse over the next 12 to 18 months. And we’ve seen rents skyrocket by 22 per cent since they came to government. So, they’ve got a shocking record on housing and I think they’ve just realised that Australians have marked them down massively and at the same time, under his watch, Australia is building record fewer homes and they’ve bought in a million new migrants with absolutely no idea where those people are going to live, which is driving so many of the negative outcomes that Australians are feeling and no amount of these sorts of too little, too late announcements will change. I think the correct view that people have, which is this is Labor’s housing crisis and it’s getting worse.

Pete Stefanovic: But with your support of its current policy, might new homes be built faster?

Michael Sukkar: Which policy exactly, Pete? Because there’s no policy this Government’s announced that builds more homes. That’s the problem. They keep talking about – ‘We want to build more homes’, yet they’re building 40 per cent fewer homes. I mean, Australia has regularly built more than 200,000 homes per annum. That’s been a very regular occurrence in this country. Now we’re down to 160,000. And at the time when housing has dropped like a stone, they’ve decided to bringing in a million new migrants over two years, which is completely out of kilter. You don’t need, your viewers don’t need to be experts to realise that when you ramp up migration to that level and yet you’re building fewer homes, the housing outcomes are going to be worse. So, there’s nothing that this government’s suggesting or announced that’s going to increase housing stock, which is obviously a terrible thing for Australians.

Pete Stefanovic: That’s a good point on on migration. Now, you would have seen the Fed Reserve cut interest rates today. As Evan Lucas explained just a short time ago, we might now be looking at five interest rate cuts next year, which would likely rev up the housing market again, therefore exposing the lack of it for those most vulnerable is the lack of action from both parties over the many years going to be exposed again?

Michael Sukkar: Well, no, I don’t accept that, Pete. When this government came to office, there were more first home buyers, there were more homes being built, there were more homes being approved on every single statistic. We’ve gone massively backwards. And I’m not talking just going backwards by a little bit. We have gone massively backwards under Anthony Albanese’s watch. And as I said, the scary thing is approvals are down. Now, approvals of the homes that are going to be built in the next 12 to 18 months, if they’re down, Labor’s housing crisis is set to get worse, not better. And nothing that the Government’s doing or advancing is seeking to address any of that. They are hopeless. They’ve got bills in the Senate this week that they’re saying are urgent. It took them two and a half years to bring them forward. These were election commitments that they took to the last election and we’re nearly at the end of their first term before they even introduced them. This government is hopeless. And, you know, we see the results in the housing market on a daily basis.

Pete Stefanovic: Just a quick one outside your space this morning, but there’s movement in childcare. The Government’s pushing to expand free childcare. The Productivity Commission has watered down some of those hopes, though if this is an election sweetener, Michael, what would you add? What would you do about it?

Michael Sukkar: Well, I think there’s 56 recommendations, 1,000 pages we’re working through. I think the Productivity Commission report did highlight, though, that costs for parents are up by 8.6 per cent, childcare costs for parents. So again, we’ve seen Labor talk a really big game on childcare and yet when you actually sit down and do the analysis and look at the outcome, parents are paying 8.5 per cent more. Just another area where this Government’s rhetoric and delivery are so far apart that it’s embarrassing. So we’ll work through those thousand pages and those 56 recommendations. And just as we did in the last term of the Coalition government, we will be seeking to make more places available at the most affordable price for parents.

Pete Stefanovic: Alright. We’ll leave it there. Michael Sukkar, the Shadow Housing Minister, thanks for your time.

ENDS