Michael Sukkar MP

Interview with Chris Kenny – Sky News Australia

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

TRANSCRIPT

INTERVIEW WITH  CHRIS KENNY – SKY NEWS AUSTRALIA

Wednesday 16 October, 2024

TOPICS: Housing crisis

E&OE

Chris Kenny: Let’s catch up now with the Shadow Housing Minister, Michael Sukkar, who joins us live from Melbourne. Thanks for joining us, Michael. Very keen to speak to you because Albo’s cack-handed real estate investments has delivered a bit of a gift for the Opposition. Throwing the housing crisis right into the front and centre of the political debate. But what can you do? What would the Coalition do in government to ease the housing crisis?

Michael Sukkar: Well, thanks, Chris. Anthony Albanese’s out of his depth and I think people would be less concerned about his own property purchases if he hadn’t so badly managed our housing system in Australia. On every single measure, Chris, housing on his watch has drastically gone backwards, whether it’s the number of first home buyers at record lows, whether it’s the number of homes being built, the number of approvals, and we’ve got record low approvals, which sadly means if we’re in a housing crisis now, it’s due to get worse because those are the approvals of homes to be built in the next 12 to 18 months. Meanwhile, whilst building fewer homes and having fewer first time buyers, he’s ramped up migration to huge levels, more than a million people in two years. So we made very clear what we would do. We’ll have much more to say before the election, but we will reduce migration for more than a thousand 100,000 homes for Australians, Peter Dutton made that clear in his Budget in Reply speech. We will allow first time buyers to access up to $50,000 of their super to help them with the deposit hurdle, and we’ll have a big focus on home ownership. You don’t hear anything out of this government on home ownership. They wave the white flag on home ownership and we will have a single minded focus on ensuring that the next generation of Australians are able to buy their own home and I can assure you we will have a suite of serious policy to deliver, and the truth is, we haven’t seen that for two and a half years from this government, so there will be a fair bit to catch up on.

Chris Kenny: Yeah, that’s a big difference, right? And then you can focus on trying to make more housing available, encourage people, help them get into buying their own home. Labor’s plan is about government investment in social housing, more government money sort of subsidising developers to build social housing and even subsidising taking part ownership of people’s houses with them. Let’s listen to their minister to describe this, she seems to think it’s bold. Have a look:

Clare O’Neil grab:
“This man leads an Australian government that is more bold and ambitious on addressing the housing needs of Australians than we’ve had in many decades. My focus is on the housing needs of ordinary people out there and our incredibly bold and ambitious plan to get those housing needs addressed. Our government is the most bold and ambitious that we’ve had on housing for a generation.”

Chris Kenny: ‘Bold and ambitious’ in case you missed it. Now, when I hear governments talking about bold and ambitious plans with taxpayers’ money, I get very worried. What I’m really interested in is this policy you’ve alluded to. You took it late to the last election. I think Australians are willing to hear much more about this, and that is the idea of getting access to their super – they’re forced to make super contributions as compulsory saving. Why shouldn’t all people be allowed to access a certain portion of that, whether it’s 50 per cent, 25 per cent, whatever, to help them get into the market, it’s their money.

Michael Sukkar: Well, Chris, the only people that argue against it are people who believe that that money belongs to the super funds. And we’re very different in the Coalition. We think that money belongs to Australians, it’s their hard-earned money that’s put into super. It was my policy as Housing Minister before the last election. Admittedly, we announced it quite late in the campaign to allow first home buyers access up to $50,000 of their own super to put towards a deposit. We know the deposit hurdle is one of the biggest barriers to home ownership in this country and you don’t need to be a Rhodes Scholar to work out that once you make your 11.5 per cent mandatory superannuation contributions, you pay your tax, you pay your HECS, you pay your rent, there’s very little left over to save for a deposit. So, providing Australians with that access is important. And one key feature of the super housing program that Peter Dutton has reaffirmed is we will require people to put that money back in once they sell that home. And the average first home buyer holds a property for seven years. So they’ll need to put that money back into their super at the end, which basically means you get the best of both worlds. You get the use of that money when you need it for a deposit, but you also continue to grow your superannuation balance. The big difference being when you get to the end of your working life, Chris, not only do you have a healthy super balance, but you actually own your own home. Because if you enter retirement not owning your own home, we know that your retirement outcomes are infinitely worse.

Chris Kenny: It’s such good policy, it makes so much sense. It helps people get into the housing market with their own money, doesn’t cost the government money and all power to your arm. We’ll keep talking about the other ways to fight the housing crisis in the months ahead. Thanks for joining us, Michael Sukkar.

ENDS