QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE
Ms O'NEIL (Hotham—Minister for Housing, Minister for Homelessness and Minister for Cities) (14:23): I thank the member for Forde for his question. The member for Forde has tens of thousands of people living in his electorate who are today getting a hand with their housing needs from our Albanese government. I know he's a passionate advocate for making sure that his constituents get into their first home.
In Forde alone, more than 2,000 people have taken up our government's five per cent deposit program to get into their first home since we were elected in 2022. The member for Forde has lots of renters living in his electorate. In his electorate alone, more than 20,000 people have received an almost 50 per cent increase to their Commonwealth rent assistance.
That's 20,000 out of a million households around the country. But that's not it. As part of our work for renters, the Prime Minister has ensured that every single renter in our country is today getting better rental standards because of his willingness to push the states to implement a better deal for renters.
Renting is really tough. When our government thinks about housing policy, it's renters that we have in mind, so it was really encouraging to see some reporting today that rents across the capital cities have now stabilised for five quarters. This is really good news even though there is a lot more work to do.
When I talk to renters, I usually get one single message from them: whatever their current housing challenges, the thing that bothers them the most is that many cannot see a realistic pathway to getting into a home of their own. That is why our government has expanded our five per cent deposit program to make every single first home buyer in our country eligible for government support.
Our five per cent deposit program will slash the average time it takes to save for a deposit from over a decade to just two to three years. I talked about some central pieces of the government's agenda just now, and I really want you to understand that none of the critical actions on the housing crisis that we are taking today are supported by the opposition, who over a wasted decade sat on the benches behind me doing absolutely nothing about the housing challenges that were growing before their eyes.
They then spent the following three years being housing hypocrites, trying to slow us down and hold us back from addressing the crisis while complaining that not enough was being done. What worries me the most about all of this is that we're in this new term of parliament, there are fresh faces and there is fresh air in the chamber, but the same old negative attitudes prevailed.
We heard the opposition housing spokesperson say today of the government's agenda, 'The government shouldn't be doing things at all.' The opposition doesn't want us to build more homes, they don't want us to help renters and they don't want us to support more Australians into homeownership. They have not a single useful thing to say about one of the biggest issues facing the country.
We've got a $43 billion agenda building more homes, helping renters get a better deal and getting more Australians into homeownership.