Thursday, 3 April 2025

 Sonya KILKENNY (Carrum – Attorney-General, Minister for Planning) (14:29): The Allan Labor government is absolutely committed to building more homes for Victorians. Over the past 18 ‍months this government has conducted the largest consultation and engagement with the Victorian community ever undertaken in this state, and the response has been enormous – more than 110,000 ‍Victorians engaging with us and helping to write our Plan for Victoria. Ten thousand more participated in community engagement for more homes in our 10 pilot activity centres. The message is clear: we need more homes, we need them close to public transport, to services and to jobs, and we need them now. With every day, more and more Victorians, particularly young Victorians, are getting left behind, and it is just not fair. Decisive action is needed, and decisive action is what the Allan Labor government is taking.

Whether it is planning for more homes near our train and tram stations, kickstarting the townhouse revolution or getting on with delivering Australia’s biggest housing project, the Suburban Rail Loop, we start now. Victoria’s townhouse code will help make Victoria the townhouse capital of the nation, building more affordable, comfortable, sustainable and well-located homes right across Melbourne and regional Victoria. The Suburban Rail Loop will be Australia’s largest housing project, delivering 70,000 homes in some of the very best locations, and there is our new train and tram zone activity centre program to build 360,000 new homes in places where it makes sense to build them. But all of these homes are under threat. The opposition home blockers are hatching a secret Liberal plan to overturn these important reforms. This is a politically motivated attack on more homes. I have never seen a group so eager to deprive Victorians of a new home. We will build more Victorian homes.