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representatives vote 2024-02-28#2
Edited by
mackay staff
on
2024-03-14 14:34:30
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Title
Bills — Help to Buy Bill 2023, Help to Buy (Consequential Provisions) Bill 2023; Consideration in Detail- Help to Buy Bill 2023, Help to Buy (Consequential Provisions) Bill 2023 - Consideration in Detail - Directions are to be disallowable
Description
<p class="speaker">Allegra Spender</p><p>by leave—I move amendments (1) to (3), as circulated in my name, together:</p>-
- The majority voted against [amendments](https://www.openaustralia.org.au/debate/?id=2024-02-28.117.2) introduced by Wentworth MP [Allegra Spender](https://theyvoteforyou.org.au/people/representatives/wentworth/allegra_spender) (Independent), which means it failed.
- ### What do the amendments do?
- Ms Spender [explained that](https://www.openaustralia.org.au/debate/?id=2024-02-28.117.2):
- > *My amendment would simply make the minister's directions a disallowable instrument. It will give the parliament the opportunity to scrutinise the minister's decisions about eligibility and reporting. Where the minister has tried to make directions that fall short of the community's expectations, parliament will have the power to veto those decisions. The minister's office have said that they do not support this amendment because the scheme needs certainty and because it would delay the commencement of the scheme. I appreciate the need for certainty with a scheme that involves our state and territory governments and a number of private lenders, but a disallowance only needs to stand for 15 sitting days before the directions become permanent and participants have complete certainty.*
- ### Amendment text
- > *(1) Clause 24, page 16 (line 14), omit "Note 1", substitute "Note".*
- >
- > *(2) Clause 24, page 16 (lines 17 to 19), omit the note.*
- >
- > *(3) Clause 24, page 16 (after line 27), at the end of the clause, add:*
- >
- >> *(5) Despite regulations made for the purposes of paragraph 44(2)(b) of the Legislation Act 2003, section 42 of that Act (about disallowance) applies in relation to a direction given under subsection (1) of this section.*
<p class="italic">(1) Clause 24, page 16 (line 14), omit "Note 1", substitute "Note".</p><p class="italic">(2) Clause 24, page 16 (lines 17 to 19), omit the note.</p><p class="italic">(3) Clause 24, page 16 (after line 27), at the end of the clause, add:</p><p class="italic">(5) Despite regulations made for the purposes of paragraph 44(2)(b) of the <i>Legislation Act 2003</i>, section 42 of that Act (about disallowance) applies in relation to a direction given under subsection (1) of this section.</p><p>Prior to the last election the Parliamentary Budget Office reviewed the Help to Buy policy. It estimated the scheme would involve equity contributions from the taxpayer of up to $22 billion over the medium term. While I support the intent of the scheme, I'm deeply uncomfortable providing any minister with this amount of public money with so little in the way of oversight and accountability.</p><p>If you look at the Help to Buy Bill 2023 you will not find any rules about who is eligible for the scheme, the number or value of the mortgages it will underwrite or how different jurisdictions will be treated. None of this is contained in the bill. Instead it is all within the power of the minister to determine by regulation, which is not subject to disallowance. Similarly, when it comes to the scheme's public reporting about how many Australians will benefit, how much support they're receiving and where those benefits are going, this is left out of the bill and put entirely in the minister's hands. In other words, the public will only know what the minister wants us to know about the scheme.</p><p>There are some restrictions on the minister's power. The minister must consult with the states on some matters. The minister may not intervene to support a specific borrower or property. The minister must undertake a review of the scheme after three years. For someone who believes in public integrity, I find the lack of restrictions deeply concerning, especially when we're talking about billions of dollars of public money. I'm not making any claims about the current minister, but this scheme will run for years, potentially decades, and ministers will come and go. We ought to legislate the integrity of the scheme right from the beginning.</p><p>My amendment would simply make the minister's directions a disallowable instrument. It will give the parliament the opportunity to scrutinise the minister's decisions about eligibility and reporting. Where the minister has tried to make directions that fall short of the community's expectations, parliament will have the power to veto those decisions. The minister's office have said that they do not support this amendment because the scheme needs certainty and because it would delay the commencement of the scheme. I appreciate the need for certainty with a scheme that involves our state and territory governments and a number of private lenders, but a disallowance only needs to stand for 15 sitting days before the directions become permanent and participants have complete certainty. Certainty is only created when there is some possibility of disallowance when the minister's directions are at odds with what the parliament is willing to support. If the parliament does not support what the minister intends to do or how she intends to use billions of dollars of public money, it is appropriate that that investment or expenditure does not proceed.</p><p>Letting this bill go through without adequate checks and balances is a dangerous precedent to set for future governments. I strongly support action to help people get into homeownership and I believe a shared-equity scheme is one of the right ways to go about it. But I was elected on a platform of integrity, as were so many of us here today, and integrity means that we cannot give a minister a blank cheque without adequate oversight or accountability, even if we support the underlying policy.</p><p>I commend my amendments to the House.</p> <p class="speaker">Michael Sukkar</p><p>In relation to the amendment moved by the member, firstly, I thank the member for her prior notice in relation to the amendment and the constructive discussions we had. We won't be supporting the amendment because, although it's well intentioned and we completely understand that the Help to Buy Bill 2023 is a hollow bill with very little detail—the bill is here 20 months after the election and more than 12 months after this scheme should have commenced, on 1 January 2023. You'd expect there to be detail in the bill. I absolutely understand where the member is coming from, but, ultimately, this scheme cannot be recovered through any amendments, and therefore we won't be supporting it.</p><p>What we've witnessed in this debate is quite instructive of the concerns that many in the House quite rightly have about this scheme. Firstly, we saw the government pull their speakers on the bill. We can understand that the backbenchers in the government wouldn't have been particularly enthusiastic in speaking about a program that has received the sort of feedback that it has—the absolute inadequacy of the program. We saw the backbenchers being pulled from the speaking list. Now we have the debate being guillotined, which shows how ashamed the government is of this proposal.</p><p>We saw a correlation when coalition members started speaking about the fact that shared-equity schemes exist in a number of jurisdictions in this country already, be it New South Wales, Victoria, Western Australia, South Australia or Tasmania. I think we saw the government backbenchers being pulled off the list when they started speaking about the fact that 94 per cent of places in the New South Wales shared-equity scheme remain available. So we have a situation now, in the middle of a housing crisis, where the government is fiddling with a policy that has already been rejected by Australians throughout this country. Why? Because they don't want the Prime Minister sitting at their kitchen table. They don't want the scrutiny associated with it. They certainly haven't got answers from this government. So we can understand why the member is moving these amendments seeking more oversight over the minister because of these basic questions that cannot be answered.</p><p>The purchase of a home is the biggest single investment most people will make in their lives, and they need certainty when they make those investments. We have a situation where a thought bubble from the Prime Minister before the election has taken 20 months to arrive in this House. You would expect if somebody brought their homework 20 months late it would be an A+ effort. What has been brought to the chamber is a bill with scant detail and the concerns that most Australians would have not answered. For example, as speaker after speaker in this House has outlined, the government is going to own 40 per cent of your home and they are going to take 40 per cent, therefore, when you sell, but are they responsible for the repairs and maintenance throughout the life of that property? If you have a leaky roof and you have to go and spend a few thousand dollars to fix it, will you send an invoice off to the government for them to reimburse you for their 40 per cent or do you wear that cost even though at the end the government are going to take their 40 per cent and the growth in the scheme, thank you very much. These very basic questions need to be answered.</p><p>For example, has the government modelled under the income caps in place, a combined income of $120,000 or a single income of $90,000, how many suburbs in Sydney in which you can buy a home with an income of $90,000? That would be interesting answer. Has the government modelled that? The government says, 'We have set aside $5.5 billion for 10,000 places,' and yet there are shared-equity places available in every single territory that's currently got a shared-equity scheme. As I was saying to the member for Wentworth, it's like walking into a shop absolutely full of a certain product it can't sell and then the manager says, 'Bring another pallet in here of this product Australians don't want.' That's not the answer to the housing crisis. We want a serious response from this government. This is not a serious response. We understand the reservations, but we won't be supporting— <i>(Time expired)</i></p> <p class="speaker">Julie Collins</p><p>I want to thank the member for the intent with which she has come into this place with these amendments. The government have made clear that we won't be supporting these amendments. Its typical for instruments like this to be exempt from disallowance, such as Housing Australia investment mandate, the housing bond aggregator and the Home Guarantee Scheme. This would work in the same way. I want to be clear that we intend to make the program details public. We will do that. Some of them are already available in terms of our election commitment that was made. We are relying on the lending institutions as well. We need to be really clear with them about what the parameters are of the program. I understand where the member's coming from with this, but we need certainty for lenders and we need certainty for borrowers. We don't want it to be at the whim of a parliament, which is why were not supporting these amendments.</p> <p class="speaker">Allegra Spender</p><p>Thank you, Minister, for your comments. I think my question really goes to the heart of this, which is in our discussions in your office we were told that you have those concerns but you're wanting certainty. My argument is that it's only 15 days that I'm asking for for disallowability. That could give people the certainty. It's not a long period of time that it would have to be open for. I see that that would be appropriate. It would give appropriate parliamentary oversight. Just because other instruments have been passed in the past without that parliamentary oversight, I don't think that is a justification, in this case, for no longer having that oversight.</p> <p class="speaker">Milton Dick</p><p>The question before the House is that the amendments moved by the honourable member for Wentworth be agreed to.</p><p></p><p></p> -
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