In June, Labor proposed a new $10 billion housing future fund, but the Greens essentially blocked it.
Labor wants to reactivate their Help To Buy scheme which proposes to borrow $10 billion to invest in the future fund and then spend $500 million a year from the fund on social and affordable housing. But the Greens have said they will only support the future fund if it included rent caps and freezes as well as $2.5 billion allocated to “public, community and affordable housing”.
“What this boils down to is a push in the middle of a massive housing crisis to do a bit more on the housing crisis rather than lock in what we would argue is failure.”
Max Chandler-Mather, Greens Federal housing spokesperson
“Rents are going up at the fastest rate we’ve seen in 35 years and 62% of renters are in financial stress. We also know, the Reserve Bank of Australia, the one that keeps chucking up our interest rates. They’ve actually said that they expect rents to go up faster over the next 12 months.”
In today’s episode of The Briefing, Tom Tilley sits down with Greens Federal housing spokesperson, Max Chandler-Mather to ask can the Greens successfully negotiate a freeze on rents and is this the answer to Australia’s crippling rental crisis?