Wednesday, 18 October 2023

 Tim READ (Brunswick) (14:22): My question is for the Premier. The government plans to demolish public housing towers, replacing them with mostly private and some social housing, starting with five towers in inner Melbourne in the next few years. With most of these homes planned to be privately owned, this is an effective privatisation of urban public housing land. With more than 125,000 people on the public housing waiting list, doesn’t this privatisation of public housing land mean that the government is effectively walking away from providing government-owned – (Time expired)

The SPEAKER: I believe there was part of a question before your time expired. I ask the Premier to respond to the question that was heard.

 Jacinta ALLAN (Bendigo East – Premier) (14:23): We on this side of the house are incredibly proud of the significant investment we are making in housing to make sure, particularly for people who rely on public housing, who rely on the government to be both the provider of the home and to also support the maintenance of that home – we are incredibly proud of the investment we have made through the $5.3 billion Big Housing Build, added to with the $1 billion that we are investing in regional communities. That is work, which we will continue, that will significantly increase the number of homes that we are building for people that the member for Brunswick referred to who are relying on the Victorian government as their housing provider. We are proud to be doing that, and we are proud to be taking that one step further, significantly further, with the biggest urban renewal opportunity to redevelop all of the 44 public housing tower sites over a number of years, because this will take a number of years.

And you know what this will do? This will increase again the number of homes that the Victorian government will be building for people who rely on Victorian government homes. That is exactly what we will be doing at these locations. We will be increasing the number of homes at each of these sites by 10 per cent. But we will also be going one step further and providing – because these sites are large and because these sites are close to jobs, schools, services and public transport they are exactly the sorts of sites that we should be looking at to increase the overall supply of homes for Victorians. That is exactly why we have taken this opportunity, clearly not supported by the Leader of the Opposition because he cannot help himself but interject constantly.

We had hoped that maybe someone like the member for Brunswick would know in his community of the challenges that a project like the Nightingale project has had to be able to build just the sorts of homes that we need in a community like Merri-bek – the challenge that they have had in being able to get that property developed because of the Merri-bek council. This is exactly why we have to push ahead. We have seen too on the Fitzroy gasworks site, which is also close to the member for Brunswick’s site – and I was there recently – where we are not just building more homes on that site, the government had to step in and –

Members interjecting.

The SPEAKER: The member for Richmond can leave the chamber for half an hour. Other members will be removed as well without warning.

Member for Richmond withdrew from chamber.

Jacinta ALLAN: We will continue to do everything we can to build more homes for people who rely on the Victorian government as their housing provider but also to increase the supply opportunities for all Victorians, because this is such a critical issue.

 Tim READ (Brunswick) (14:26): With a 10 per cent increase in social housing – that is 440 new social housing units over 28 years, which is an average increase of 15.7 social homes per year – it is hardly a big build. Why doesn’t the government lift its ambition to match the scale of the crisis and build a significant number of additional public homes rather than the average 15.7 per year currently planned?

Steve Dimopoulos interjected.

The SPEAKER: The Minister for Environment is warned.

 Jacinta ALLAN (Bendigo East – Premier) (14:27): Perhaps the member for Brunswick missed the references I made in the answer to his substantive question around the $5.3 billion plus $1 billion that we are investing right now in building more homes for more Victorians. Sadly, on too many occasions we have seen the Greens political party at local government level not support investments by Homes Victoria, by the government, to build more homes on key locations. We have to build more homes, and that is why we are making this significant investment. We would hope that the Greens would stop being about the fight and work with us on the fix, because that is what we need to do. Having these sorts of arguments and blocking supply does not support people in Brunswick, in Bendigo, in Brighton – oh, maybe Brighton, you know, with all due respect. We have got to make sure that we build more homes for all Victorians.