Wednesday, 5 March 2025

Bills

Help to Buy (Commonwealth Powers) Bill 2025

Second reading

Debate resumed.

Kathleen MATTHEWS-WARD (Broadmeadows) (18:18): The Victorian Homebuyer Fund has been so successful and the federal government have loved the idea so much that they have come up with their own scheme: Help to Buy. Staggered allocations will ensure that the Victorian Homebuyer Fund continues to support Victorian home ownership until Help to Buy is established. This means no-one will miss out. The Victorian Homebuyer Fund will close to new applicants on 30 June 2025, when the state will transition to Help to Buy. The State Revenue Office will continue to administer existing Victorian Homebuyer Fund participants.

By adopting the Commonwealth’s Help to Buy Act 2024 the bill will enable Victorians to participate in the Commonwealth’s new shared equity scheme. Help to Buy will replace the Victorian Homebuyer Fund, and it is expected to support 10,000 low-to-middle-income Victorians to purchase a new home over the next four years. The Victorian Homebuyers Fund paved the way for Help to Buy, which will provide even more opportunity for Victorians to buy their own home.

The Commonwealth will provide up to 40 per cent of the purchase price as an equity contribution under Help to Buy, a higher proportion than the Victorian Homebuyer Fund, in which the government has provided 25 per cent of the purchase price, or up to 35 per cent for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Victorians. The equity contribution under Help to Buy will, in turn, reduce the overall mortgage repayments for home owners due to the shared equity scheme resulting in a lower loan amount. This will have a significant impact on the cost of living. Help to Buy also has a lower minimum deposit of 2 per cent, compared to the 5 per cent of the homebuyer fund, or 3.5 per cent for Indigenous Australian homebuyer fund applicants.

Saving a deposit is one of the biggest obstacles to getting into the property market for many Victorians. Many low and middle income earners find it difficult to save in addition to their regular living expenses, and I think that is even harder for single Victorians paying rent and utilities on their own with the cost of living going up. The lower minimum deposit will particularly help them and will help everyone with Help to Buy, and help those utilising the scheme to be able to enter a home sooner, with the typical years of putting money aside greatly reduced.

In a further expansion, the Commonwealth Help to Buy scheme includes provisions for off-the-plan and other types of new homes, which will help more Victorians into their homes but also stimulate housing in this state. It will also avoid the need for lenders mortgage insurance, an additional expense at the purchase time that many home owners do not have the savings to cover. In order to avoid mortgage insurance a 20 per cent deposit would normally be required from the borrower, which is a far cry from the 2 per cent required under the Help to Buy scheme, with no insurance premium on top. Applicants purchasing in Melbourne and Geelong are expected to be able to purchase a property for up to $850,000 and in regional Victoria up to $650,000.

Under the Commonwealth constitution Help to Buy cannot operate in the states unless it either refers the relevant state powers or adopts the Commonwealth legislation, and what we are doing today through this bill is adopting the Commonwealth Help to Buy Act 2024. It will mean that Help to Buy will be able to operate in Victoria and assist more hardworking Victorians into the housing market. That is why the bill is before us today, and the Allan Labor government is committed to addressing housing needs right across Victoria.

Shared equity schemes are only one part of the puzzle. We also need to build more homes to increase supply, and we have embarked on that Big Housing Build, which when completed will deliver a 10 per cent uplift in the total amount of social housing stock in Victoria. I am so proud of this investment in social and affordable housing in particular. With the help of the fabulous Broadmeadows Revitalisation Board and the advocacy of the Banksia Gardens community centre, I have been able to secure a huge $80 million investment for 120 new homes in Banksia Gardens, the biggest investment in Broadmeadows in history. The new homes will be modern, comfortable and environmentally sustainable, and include fully accessible units for people with disabilities right in the heart of Broadmeadows, close to shops, transport services and education facilities. Construction is already underway, and it is a pleasure to watch the project take form.

Only Labor is taking real action on housing, and this social housing project is funded 50–50 between the federal and state Labor governments. With record investments in our Big Housing Build and the social housing accelerator, Labor governments are working together and delivering projects to ensure more people have a safe place to call home. Under the current Victorian homebuyer scheme you can borrow through Bank Australia, Commonwealth, Bendigo, Unity Bank and Indigenous Business Australia. I was really happy to see that there was a broad range in there, but I have the biggest Islamic population in the state, and there are different requirements for Islamic finance. I was really proud to bring in Kingsley David from MCCA Islamic Finance and Investments and my good friend Ekrem Fuldagli to talk to the Treasurer and their office about expanding the range of lenders on there. Given that this scheme is transitioning into the Commonwealth scheme, I know that they have been put in touch with the Commonwealth government to make sure there are options for everyone that are suitable for their faith and their circumstances, so I am really proud that there will be options for everyone to own their home through the shared equity scheme. In fact the shared equity scheme is very similar to the Islamic borrowing schemes, where money is only used as a medium of exchange for the purchase of assets. Shared equity is a merit of the Help to Buy scheme. There are many opportunities to engage the Commonwealth government in these discussions to ensure the Islamic finance sector is given the opportunity for its members to be able to participate in the Help to Buy funding allocations and to make sure they are not limited to non-Islamic finance.

The Allan Labor government has long recognised the issue of housing affordability in Victoria and also across Australia. It is the reason this government created the Victorian Homebuyer Fund in 2021 and announced the bold vision to deliver 800,000 new dwellings over 10 years in Victoria’s housing statement in 2023. We more recently announced a number of measures to assist more people into housing, from freeing up government land to build on, to activity centres around transport hubs. The Help to Buy scheme will benefit from those measures through making affordable housing more available and closer to transport and employment centres. I commend the bill to the house.

Wayne FARNHAM (Narracan) (18:25): I am pleased to rise today to contribute on the Help to Buy (Commonwealth Powers) Bill 2025, although I do feel as though the cart is a bit before the horse on this one. I would have thought this would be a bill, as per the reasoned amendment that the member of Brighton put forward, that we would actually discuss after the federal election. I mean, I am not Nostradamus – I do not know what is going to happen in the federal election and whether there will be a change of government or not – but to me it would have made common sense if this bill was debated at a point in time when we knew whether it was going to be a new Labor government or whether it was going to be a coalition or whether it was going to be a hung Parliament, for that matter. We just do not know, so I do feel as though we have jumped the gun here a little bit. But we are here to talk about this. As the member for Brighton stated earlier, we will obviously be voting on the reasoned amendment but we will not oppose the bill if we lose that vote. I can just imagine how that vote is going to go on Thursday. But the debate has been very wideranging today and has not just stuck to this bill. There has been a lot of discussion today about housing affordability and why housing is so much less affordable now, hence probably why these schemes come into play.

It was pointed out earlier by the member for Gippsland South that it could be contributing to the affordability of housing that we have 60 new taxes that this government has brought in and 30 of those relate to property. I said in my inaugural speech – and just on that, congratulations to the member for Werribee on his inaugural speech and getting that out of the way today – that every time you introduce another tax or charge to developers it gets passed down the line. It is very, very simple. And listen, I know there is some legislation coming forward, probably next sitting week – building legislation – and I will address that then. I know there are charges associated there on bonds, but they will get passed down the line, make no mistake about it. Every time there is another tax or charge, it gets passed down the line. We have had the Housing Industry Association say that 40 per cent of the construction cost of homes is tax related.

I listened very carefully to the member of Mordialloc today. I mean, he sort of regurgitated partly, in the matter of public importance, what he said earlier. He has obviously got very good muscle memory. He said the same thing. He said affordability now is 9 to 1. I will tell you what it was in 2014 – 4 to 1. That is a big difference. So under this government affordability of housing has blown right out, and a lot of that has to do with the taxes associated with construction and land. It is just typical of this government, which literally cannot manage money and is now taxing everybody to the hilt. This is why housing is unaffordable. This is why schemes like this probably have to exist. It is really that simple, and I do not know why the government does not understand this: if you want to get an economy moving again, you cannot tax it out of existence.

We are losing investors out of this state at a rapid rate. They are leaving in droves. They are getting out of Victoria because of the taxes and charges, and that means less housing supply. If you do not have people investing in the state in housing and in investment properties, you are going to have rental problems. You are going to have rental demand, which will drive the price up as well, because if there are no places to rent, that pushes the price up – supply and demand. We have heard it many a time in this chamber.

We have seen the government come out on its 60 precincts. This is going to go to solve the housing problem – the 60 precincts. I think it is going to house – the figure I have been hearing – 360,000 people, but then we have got the development community coming out and saying it is not viable. It is okay to come out and put something on a bit of paper and say it is what you are going to do, but if you are listening to the industry and they are saying it is not viable, you will not achieve that goal. It is really plain and simple. We have got the development community saying, ‘Well, you can create all the precincts you want; we’re not going to build them.’ Is the government going to build them? I doubt it. They do not have the money to start with. They do not have the money to do that type of development, so you have got to rely on the private sector, but the private sector is saying it is not viable.

You can announce all the precincts you want, but unless you get the development community on board it will never happen and you cannot get the development community on board when you continually tax them. To be honest, my opinion of the 60 precincts is: it is not a housing policy, it is a tax policy. People go, ‘Why is that? Why is it a tax policy?’ Because you have to rezone land. What happens when you rezone land in this state? You get hit with windfall gains tax, another tax. Where do you think that tax is going to go? It is going to go onto the price of the apartment, the unit or whatever gets built on that site. It is not a housing policy. It is a tax policy. This is why development is getting driven out of this state.

We have already heard this government say, ‘Our target is 800,000 homes over 10 years,’ but at the start it was 80,000 homes a year. Then they realised they are not going to make that, so they just changed the narrative and called it 800,000 over 10 years. Divided by 10, it is still 80,000 homes a year. In the first year you delivered just a titch over 50,000 homes. Remember this came out in September 2023, so to September 2024 you are about 26,000 homes shy of that target. I know that the next year is not going to be any better. I would guess by September 2025 that the government is going to be somewhere between 50,000 and 60,000 homes short on supply of their target. Again, it is not a target set in stone. It is someone who has come up with an idea and said, ‘80,000 sounds great. We’ll just say 80,000.’ If they actually did their research on how housing has been constructed over this state from 1990 through to today, they would know on average we only built 46,000 homes a year. They would know that the best year we ever had was in 2017, and that was 75,000 homes – before the Big Build ramped up, before they sucked all the labour out of the domestic construction industry and put it into infrastructure. They would know that affordability back then was a lot better because, when they put everything on the line at once, all the prices went up. Again, supply and demand – it is a pretty easy rule to follow.

In saying that, how are we going to achieve any targets when today, as opposed to 18 months ago, I think we have nearly 800 less builders in this state. They have gone into liquidation. They are gone, simple as that. They have left the industry or they have gone into liquidation – nearly 800 less builders. Australia-wide, 28 per cent of liquidations are builders, and Victoria is the highest contributor to that. Not only that, today as opposed to 12 months ago, we have over 21,000 less tradies. The government can get up here and spruik to me all they want about what they are going to do – ‘We’re going to set this figure here and that figure there’ – but it is all a load of rubbish. It cannot be achieved. Quite frankly, the government might not even be aware of this, so I am going to educate the government on what is happening at the moment on the Big Build projects, the ones that are finished up. The people who come off those Big Build projects, the big infrastructure projects, are not staying in Victoria; they are going north. They are chasing the money. They are going to Queensland because Queensland is gearing up for the Olympic Games. They are doing the big infrastructure projects.

This is the problem this government has created in this state. You have got a paddle-pop person earning $200,000 a year. He could have been an ex-tradie. Do you think he is going to go back and build a house, build a frame, do a fix-out, do a rough-in, do eaves or whatever for 1500 bucks a week? No; he will chase the money. Good on him. I would do the same if I still had the nail bag on. Why wouldn’t I? But this is the problem the government has created. The problem is we have a massive housing shortage; we do not have the tradies to fix it and we do not have the builders to fix it. The member for Mordialloc can get up and spruik all he wants and call us blockers, and I can tell you now the blockers on that side are the Minister for Planning and the new Minister for Local Government, who blocked development in his electorate. Do not get up there and spruik to us about blocking. The fact of the matter is the government has created this mess. I have just gone through the affordability, how much it has gone up from 2014 to now, and quite frankly this bill is very much the cart before the horse. Wait till the election and then put the bill in.

Chris COUZENS (Geelong) (18:35): I am pleased to rise to contribute on the Help to Buy (Commonwealth Powers) Bill 2025. I want to start off by saying everyone should have the right to safe, secure and affordable housing. We know that. On this side of the chamber we know that very well, which is why we are looking at whatever we can do in terms of providing more housing in our communities. We know the challenges. We know that we have to look at different options for people to buy their homes but also to have housing on the ground, and a lot of the work that we have done over the last couple of years has led to this ability to work through what the housing needs are. Nostradamus over there that we have just heard speak – we will see if his predictions come true. That is all I will say. The reason that those opposite have ranted and raved on this bill today is because they have nothing to offer. They did not offer anything during the time that they were in government and they are not offering anything now.

As I said, this government is about ensuring that we are working to provide the housing that is necessary for everyone in our community. I think it is really important that we look at the different options, and the Help to Buy scheme is one of those options. It was originally developed here in Victoria and the Commonwealth has now taken it on, which is what this is bill is about. It is a shared equity scheme which has been modelled on the Victorian Homebuyer Fund, so of course it is important that we support this bill. The fact is that during the previous federal Liberal government they had no interest in housing. They had no interest in providing housing to our communities. This Labor government in previous terms developed this equity scheme for Victorian homebuyers, so this legislation actually allows for that to continue as a nationwide shared equity program. Victoria has been a national leader in helping young Victorians access their first home. What this bill provides is amazing. I know many in my community are really looking forward to being able to apply for this homebuyer fund because it means that they will get into housing. They will get into secure, affordable housing that they would not otherwise be able to achieve, so this is really important for them.

Under the Commonwealth constitution Help to Buy cannot operate in a state unless it either refers the relevant state powers or adopts the Commonwealth legislation. That is why this Help to Buy (Commonwealth Powers) Bill 2025 adopts the Commonwealth’s Help to Buy Act 2024. It means Help to Buy will be able to operate in Victoria and assist more hardworking Victorians into the housing market. Under the Commonwealth Help to Buy scheme, Housing Australia will make financial contributions to the purchase of residential properties in exchange for an equity share in those properties. The amendment reference in this bill is a specific and limited referral of power to the Commonwealth Parliament, and it is only for the purpose of the maintenance and operation of the Help to Buy scheme. Without this, any future amendments would not apply in Victoria, which would obviously be impractical and could potentially prevent Victorians from accessing future benefits under the scheme.

The bill will also make minor amendments to the Duties Act 2000, the First Home Owner Grant and Home Buyer Schemes Act 2000 and the Land Tax Act 2005 to clarify that the Commonwealth’s Help to Buy scheme should be treated the same way that the Victorian Homebuyer Fund was under those pieces of legislation. The Commonwealth will offer an equity contribution of up to 40 per cent of the purchase price for new homes and up to 30 per cent for existing homes. Eligible Victorians will only need a 2 per cent deposit to enter the scheme. This is a real game changer for families in our communities. It is going to make such a difference for them to achieve that home ownership.

Applicants purchasing in Melbourne and Geelong are expected to be able to purchase a property up to $850,000 and in regional Victoria $650,000, so it is a huge difference to trying to save that deposit to get into a home when you have only got to provide a 2 per cent deposit to be able to buy a home in Geelong, for example, at about $850,000, which would get you a very nice home.

The program directions will sit alongside the Help to Buy act and will assist Housing Australia with the delivery of the scheme. The program directions will contain details of the scheme, including the scheme’s eligibility criteria and obligations on participants. As I said earlier, looking at all forms of housing opportunities is something this government has been doing over a long period of time, and I am very proud that we have been able to do that, and supporting this bill is a part of that.

In Geelong, yes, there are many challenges around getting into the housing market, whether it be private rental or home ownership. We know those challenges are there, which is exactly why we are doing something about it, as opposed to those opposite, who scream and rant but actually do not present any policies as to what they are going to do if they ever achieve government. This is really important for us, and I know it is important in Geelong.

As I said, there are housing challenges there. We just recently announced 60 new homes to be built in Geelong, in Herne Hill. Sixty homes will make such a difference to so many families, and a portion of those will be social housing. They are in a fantastic community around Herne Hill. These are the sorts of things that this government is doing constantly. This is not just a once-off announcement. We have had hundreds of homes either built or purchased in Geelong over recent years to ensure that we are making a difference in our community, and in Geelong we certainly are. I know that around the state there are many other members that are experiencing the same boosts in their community.

Yes, it is very challenging. Yes, it is very difficult to continue to keep up with the housing demand, but Plan Victoria has dealt with a lot of those planning issues and are looking at what we need to do over the next 30 to 50 years to actually house the number of people that we need to house. In Geelong 128,000 houses are required over that period, so we know that it is challenging, but we are working at it. We are actually delivering on the ground and providing these houses to our communities, including mine, to try and address those housing challenges that we have.

This bill is about buying more homes, and many of them of course will be existing homes and some of them will be newly built homes. But of course shared equity schemes are only one side of housing affordability. We also need to build more homes to increase supply, which is what we have been talking about in Plan Victoria. That is why we have embarked on the Big Housing Build, which when completed will deliver a 10 per cent uplift in the total number of social housing stock in Victoria, delivering 12,000 social housing homes.

Now, as someone who grew up in social housing – and I am sure there are many on our side of the chamber that grew up in social housing or public housing –

Cindy McLeish: And ours.

Chris COUZENS: I was about to say that, Cindy. I am sure there are those that had that benefit on the opposite side. So we should not forget the advantages that we had of being able to live and grow up in public housing or social housing, It is important that we continue to offer those opportunities to young families now who are really totally reliant on social housing and public housing to be able to take care of their families. This really is an important bill. I know that in my community they are excited about this opportunity. There will be applications going in from my community, and they will be able to go out and look at purchasing a house, and in most areas of Geelong they would be able to purchase a house at $850,000. So I know there is great excitement, and I am really looking forward to the commencement of this program. I commend the bill to the house.

Chris CREWTHER (Mornington) (18:45): I rise today to speak on the Help to Buy (Commonwealth Powers) Bill 2025. Before I do so I would also like to join with colleagues across this chamber in acknowledging the member for Werribee and their maiden speech just now. I note that he mentioned he lived for a while in Dimboola and did not play footy there, but one of my fondest memories when growing up that I mentioned to him was actually beating Dimboola in a grand final. So, sorry, Dimboola.

Going to the bill, this bill adopts the Commonwealth’s Help to Buy Act 2024 to enable the Commonwealth to establish and operate its shared equity scheme Help to Buy in Victoria. The bill also makes amendments to other legislation to clarify the interaction between Help to Buy and certain Victorian entitlements, concessions and schemes available to homebuyers. In relation to this bill today I will talk about (1) the reduction in access for Victorian homebuyers, (2) the Victorian Labor government’s poor approach to the housing crisis and (3) other areas of concern.

On the first element, the reduction in access for Victorian homebuyers, the Parliamentary Budget Office estimates that approximately 30 per cent of those eligible under the current Victorian Homebuyer Fund would lose access. That is 668,800 Victorians who are eligible under the Victorian homebuyer scheme who will lose access once the Help to Buy scheme comes in, and they will lose access because the Victorian government announced that they will close the homebuyer scheme upon the Help to Buy scheme coming into force. Also, on income, in terms of single income this is capped at $90,000 under the Help to Buy scheme versus about $135,000 under the state scheme. For joint applications you currently have a threshold of income of about $216,000, which will be reduced to $120,000 under the Help to Buy scheme. House price thresholds as well are being reduced by 10.5 per cent to $850,000 in Melbourne and Geelong and in regional areas they are down by 7.1 per cent to $650,000. As well this will impact, as I mentioned, low-income households particularly because less householders in Victoria will have access under this new scheme as compared with the state scheme. So while the Victorian Labor government might save on their budget, this will come at a cost to Victorians.

Secondly, I want to outline and discuss the Victorian government’s poor approach to this housing crisis. This Help to Buy scheme does little to resolve the housing crisis, particularly, as I mentioned, as it replaces the current scheme, which gives more access than under this new Help to Buy scheme. Just some examples of this housing crisis include, for example, that the Mornington Peninsula has the fourth-highest level of homelessness in the state. In addition, we have one crisis accommodation, being the Ranch in Mornington, which I was told in the last couple of weeks will very likely close within six months, so we will be in a situation of having no crisis accommodation on the peninsula, despite the massive amount of people who are needing crisis accommodation, who are needing public housing and who are experiencing homelessness.

We also have an Allan Labor government who are obsessed with things like height approvals and density in metro areas, but who are doing little to nothing to tackle structural challenges holding back development. These sorts of things will only grow urbanisation, not resolve the housing crisis.

And if we put it in context, we have increased taxes. We have, as mentioned by the member for Narracan before, 30 new or increased taxes related to property, and these sorts of taxes are making the housing crisis worse. They are making it hard for new builds and they are increasing rental costs and thus the rents themselves. And as the member for Narracan also mentioned, schemes like these exist and need to be expanded because we do have a situation where you cannot tax to prosperity in Victoria, and the housing crisis is therefore becoming worse and worse.

Another aspect as well is that there has not been a single non-build-to-rent residential tower construction in Melbourne over the past three years. As well, the cost of construction has gone up, we have a skilled worker shortage and there is a lack of developer incentive in Victoria under this Labor government. The focus should instead be on englobo land in outer suburbs and regional areas, which are large pieces of land which are identified for future subdivision. This helps to decentralise and grow our regional centres and means that people can live in and move into houses which are often cheaper and often give community support, particularly in country areas. These days people can often work from anywhere, particularly with the internet, if they are in jobs that enable them to do so.

Instead, as I mentioned before, with urbanisation we have a government that is overly focused on our urban centres and forgetting about our outer suburbs and regional areas, including places like the Mornington Peninsula. That goes to, for example, rail projects as well like the Suburban Rail Loop versus, say, the scrapping of things like Baxter rail – which was funded under the federal government but then they scrapped their funding at the federal level because of the lack of state support – or places like Mildura, which is the largest population centre in the whole of Victoria if not Australia with no passenger rail services.

Let us go to some other areas of concern as well. One other area of concern with this bill is that there are divergent federal major party platforms and positions on this issue. The federal Liberals have committed to repealing this Help to Buy scheme if elected, and only federal Labor have committed to it. Who knows what the teals will do if they help Labor form government in a hung parliament situation. As well as that, the eligibility parameters are in draft form and not finalised. There has also been a lack of consultation, and industry has had either no or insufficient time to provide feedback. However, this lack of consultation has been dismissed as being because the Commonwealth has prohibited states from external consultation.

I will go into the three points once again in relation to this bill. As I mentioned, we have a reduction in access for Victorian homebuyers. We also have the Victorian government’s poor continued approach to the housing crisis, and as I mentioned that crisis continues in places like the Mornington Peninsula, where we have the fourth highest level of homelessness in the state. And there are many other areas of concern. That is why the Victorian opposition, as enunciated by the member for Brighton, is moving a reasoned amendment to this bill. This reasoned amendment says:

That all the words after ‘That’ be omitted and replaced with the words ‘, noting the contrasting position of the two major federal political parties on this policy, this house refuses to read this bill a second time until the outcome of the federal election is determined.’

Indeed it will be a waste of time for this bill to go ahead if this Help to Buy scheme is then abolished under a federal Liberal government. This bill is premature and a waste of time for this house when we could be discussing many other things. This is the sort of bill that should be discussed and debated after the federal election under, say, a Labor government or a minority Labor government in a hung parliament situation where we know that this Help to Buy scheme will definitely proceed.

As I mentioned, the Labor government continues to fail in housing, they continue to fail in homelessness and they continue to fail in providing sufficient social housing, including public housing, where we have a waiting list of over 63,000. If I am not wrong, I believe in 2014 the waiting list was about 9000 for public housing. It has now, as I mentioned, gone up to around 63,000, which is an atrocious situation after 10 years of this Labor government.

This Labor government talks the talk but does not walk the walk when it comes to actually delivering on some of its promises in the housing space. I call on the Labor government to reconsider what they are doing in the housing space and to reconsider moving this bill this week and in subsequent weeks, because literally it is a waste of time. We could be actually going into caretaker mode even this weekend, potentially with a 12 April election. so let us talk about bills that would actually have an impact instead of wasting our time.

Josh BULL (Sunbury) (18:55): I am pleased to have the opportunity to make what will be a reasonably short contribution this evening to this important bill, which of course goes to many of the provisions around housing and housing affordability, which has been very well canvassed in other speeches.

Before I go to what is contained in the bill before the house, I do wish to, as others have done, acknowledge the outstanding inaugural contribution from the member for Werribee. We got a sense from the new member for Werribee about his values, an understanding about what he will bring to this place and of course an understanding as he read them into his contribution of the views and wishes of local communities within his electorate – with some students, I believe – and made reference to livability and made reference to providing the very best community that can be achieved, which are of course things that I know he will bring to this place. But most importantly we understand that this side of the house will continue, both through this legislation and everything we do right across all portfolio areas, to ensure that we are working with Victorians, whether you live in a growth corridor, like I do and like the member for Werribee does, or indeed any part of our great state, to make sure that the provisions are of course provided and give people an opportunity to have a safe roof over their head.

I listened really intently to the fantastic contribution from the member for Geelong. There is a sense that through the Help to Buy (Commonwealth Powers) Bill 2025, by adopting the Commonwealth’s Help to Buy Act 2024, this bill of course enables Victorians to participate in the Commonwealth’s new shared equity scheme. Help to Buy will replace the Victorian Homebuyer Fund and is expected to support 10,000 low to middle income Victorians to purchase a home over the next four years. Victorians participating in the Commonwealth’s Help to Buy program will benefit from lower ongoing repayments from a smaller home loan as the Commonwealth will share the capital costs of purchasing a home.

This has been I think well covered by speakers through the journey this afternoon, but what is astounding – and it should not, but continues to surprise me – is of course the continued blocking, the stopping, the deflecting, the finding any which way to pull opportunities apart and to in essence block opportunities for those wishing to get a start in their local community. This comes to one of the most important decisions and opportunities that people within local communities will have, which is that everybody should have a safe roof over their head. Making sure that we are providing initiatives and policies, projects and programs that can deliver this is of course a great responsibility of our government.

What this legislation does, of course, is work with the Commonwealth, and finally there is a partner in Canberra that is willing to tackle these matters and willing to find our great state on the map. What we want to do is ensure that we are continuing to invest and continuing to build all of those supports around what will be our housing targets. They have been thoroughly identified both through the statement and all of the work that has been done particularly over the last 12 to 18 months, and this is another important piece of the puzzle when it comes to supporting those within communities who need that support. I happily commend the bill to the house.

Business interrupted under sessional orders.