QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE: TAKE NOTE OF ANSWERS

Senator ANTIC (South Australia) (15:11): We heard this afternoon Senator Canavan make the observation that Westpac now say that new home loan applications have fallen 20 per cent, while the National Australia Bank have reported a 15 per cent downturn in home loans. That in itself, under normal circumstances, would be a very alarming statistic. But, in this case, it's proof positive that this government has damaged confidence in the property market through its property taxes in a way that, certainly in the short term, may not be recoverable.

It doesn't really feel like there has never been a better time to be a first home buyer like Minister Plibersek has told us. In fact, it is, I think, actually even a broader problem than that which has been discussed here this afternoon. This is a government which has overseen some of the greatest cost spikes we have seen in recent times.

This is not just about new home loan applications and listings on realestate.com. This is one of the most expensive environments for all Australians to operate in in living memory. That applies across the board.

The war on energy, this ridiculous net zero target and the climate scam continue to be pushed out there. What see as a result of that are rising fuel prices. You can't blame it all on the Strait of Hormuz.

You can't blame it all on President Trump. Unfortunately, that's an undergraduate approach to what is really happening here. The environment itself is just completely counterproductive to building homes.

You have to get through all the state imposts, the development applications, the energy ratings, the local government approvals. Ask any person that's in the building game what they think about the current regulatory environment. That's the sort of thing that could be fixed with a snap of the fingers of this government.

We've seen how they like to guillotine laws through when it suits them. They could fix this overnight. Over the week ending 9 August, Cotality reported that the clearance rates are now 57 per cent in Sydney, 60.8 per cent in Melbourne and 38.1 per cent in Brisbane.

This is not good news for the property market because of course this country is indelibly welded to that as an economic marker. We are all concerned about the affordability of housing, especially for young Australians. But the answer to fixing that is not crashing the economy, and that's what this is going to do.

The answer to that problem is not to crash the family home. The answer actually is reducing the regulatory burden. It's reducing inflation.

It's lowering interest rates. It's rising real wages. We heard this afternoon this government heroically claim that the gender pay gap has improved for women in this country.

But, at the same time, they've gone and made everything else exponentially more expensive. So, if that is correct, women are still paying more for everything. That's the sort of meatball economics that we get from this government.

Labor's not helping Australians. They're not helping first home buyers. They're smashing confidence.

They're hitting investment. They're pushing up rents. They're building fewer homes and making it harder for young Australians to get ahead.

You don't help young Australians into homes by making them and everyone else around them poorer in the process. It can only be done through a strong economy, through lower taxes and through cheaper energy, by the way, which is the thing that is completely missed in this equation. It can only come from a government that actually rewards hard work.

That's the only way. That's the way this country was built, and that's the way we'll build it out of this housing crisis. (Time expired)