Mr BAYLEY (Clark) – Deputy Speaker, I thank the Treasurer for bringing the Taxation and Related Legislation (First Home Owner and Payroll Relief) Bill forward. The Greens support this bill. We supported this initiative in the election context and we will follow through in supporting the bill in the House today. It is obviously a bill in two parts: the first homeowners grant and then payroll relief. I thank the departmental officials for their briefing. It was very useful on this bill. It is a relatively simple change to an existing framework. It changes the $10,000 First Home Owner Grant to a $30 000 grant and it extends it from July 2025 through to June 2026, obviously noting that it is retrospective back to July 2025.
The First Home Owner Grant is an initiative we support, not without some trepidation in relation to both the budgetary impacts and market impacts in relation to house prices. However, it undoubtedly gives young people – or first homeowners, they may not necessarily be young people, but probably predominantly young people – a leg‑up. Similar to Mr Winter, perhaps a decade or so earlier than him, when I got into my first home in the early 2000s, I think the First Home Owner Grant at that point was $7000 and it was of significant assistance. It did make a difference.
However, this is a vexed issue. House prices have been skyrocketing over recent times relative to income. This has been particularly noticeable in Tasmania post‑COVID. PropTrack released its latest report on 1 September and identified that national prices increased by 0.5 per cent in August. It is the eighth consecutive month of growth. Nationally, prices have risen by 5.3 per cent in the last year. I don’t have the figures regionally in Tasmania, but in Hobart we have had a small drop of 0.5 per cent, but the annual growth over the last year has been 3.1 per cent, and the five-year growth has been 30.2 per cent.
When you have figures like that, we know that it is incredibly difficult for young people, in particular, to enter the home owner market. These kinds of initiatives make a difference. The intention is to increase the deposit and, therefore, improve accessibility for first home owners.
I acknowledge the view that, over time, the efficacy of these kinds of initiatives is diminished because of this impact on house prices more broadly. While we support this, it is certainly not a silver bullet when it comes to the housing crisis. The housing crisis is having a significant impact across the board in our community, and there are levers that need to be pulled in just about every jurisdiction.
Mr Winter mentioned some of the planning issues and we definitely need to see more reform and more incentive when it comes to medium-density development across our residential areas. Places like the northern rail corridor in my electorate of Clark is the perfect example: sitting ready and waiting for some stimulation and reform so that the kind of investment and medium-density development that can happen there does happen there.
At the national level, there has been a long debate about negative gearing and capital gains tax discounts. These are one of the most significant contributors to housing inaccessibility. Tax breaks for property developers is coming at an impact for first home owners. This is something that desperately needs to be reformed. I am proud to be part of a party that, at the national level, has put interstate property developers on notice, has flagged the need to reform negative gearing and capital gains tax. We need to make sure that interstate property investors do not get the kind of tax breaks they are currently getting for multiple investment properties. This is, effectively, stripping supply or at least accessible supply out of the market for first home owners here. Greens analysis has shown that doing away with these tax breaks would allow 850 000 people across the country to access their own home and 31 per cent of renters would shift from renting into home ownership. The cherry on top, the additional benefit in relation to that, is it would raise the kind of revenue you would need to build 600,000 public and affordable homes. This kind of reform is critically important.
At the state level, we come in here nearly every time we sit and talk about short‑stay accommodation and needing to rein in the loss of whole home rentals to short‑stay accommodation. We need to give renters more rights. This week we celebrated the opportunity to give renters the right to have pets in their rentals. That was very welcome, Attorney-General. Thank you for bringing that forward. You have also tabled the bill in relation to toppling furniture. However, there is so much more that needs to be done. We need to control out‑of-control rents. We need to rein in no‑cause evictions so that people cannot be evicted for no fault of their own. We need minimum standards in our houses so that they are comfortable and we need to allow people minor modifications. We look forward to debating the toppling furniture bill and we will bring forward some amendments there to expand the ability for tenants to undertake minor modifications.
We also acknowledge the Treasurer’s commitment to bring forward the Residential Tenancy Act review and, ultimately, deliver reforms in that space. They are overdue and we need to be doing everything we can when it comes to the housing crisis.
In the short term, a contribution for a First Home Owner Grant is welcome, acknowledging that there are some challenges, both in paying for it and the impact more broadly. Some amendments have been distributed by my colleague in Clark, Ms Johnston, which I believe will add a little bit more integrity again to this program.
Regarding the payroll tax side of this bill, again we are supportive of this initiative. I have a quick question for the Treasurer: the current scheme, as stated, applies to apprentices, trainees and youth employees, but my understanding is that this initiative is quarantined for apprentices only. The question in my mind is, why is that? There are obviously benefits from the kind of programs that are run to increase participation by trainees and youth employees so why have these been struck out in this case when they have been part of this program to date?
We will support this bill. We look forward to discussing Ms Johnston’s amendments.
