Thursday, 20 November 2025

 Nick STAIKOS (Bentleigh – Minister for Consumer Affairs, Minister for Local Government) (14:07): The Allan Labor government is bringing down the hammer on underquoting. Underquoting is an unethical practice. It is a dishonest practice. That is why we will be mandating the disclosure of reserve pricing of a property at least seven days ahead of the auction or the date of sale. Since 2017 Victoria has had the strongest laws against underquoting in all of Australia. Our underquoting taskforce has monitored thousands of sales campaigns, it has attended hundreds of auctions, it has issued fines amassing more than $2.3 million and it has collected evidence that has been used to pursue agents in the courts caught repeatedly underquoting. Our underquoting laws have been so successful that just last week New South Wales adopted every element of Victoria’s underquoting laws. Now we are taking an even bigger step by ensuring that the reserve price is disclosed ahead of auction.

Too often young first home buyers fall victim to underquoting. Deliberate underquoting by real estate agents draws homebuyers into property campaigns when all along they could not afford that property in the first place. I know that ethical real estate agents hate underquoting too. That is why a third of the complaints to the underquoting taskforce come from other real estate agents.

From next week penalties for underquoting will increase, but when this was in a bill before the Parliament earlier this year those opposite voted no. This morning the latest Leader of the Opposition had the opportunity to say if she supported stamping out underquoting, and she declined.

Members interjecting.

The SPEAKER: The member for Berwick is warned. The Leader of the House is warned.

Brad Rowswell: On a point of order, Speaker, in relation to correct parliamentary titles, there has been a pattern of behaviour by the government over the last few question times.

The SPEAKER: Order! State your point of order succinctly.

Brad Rowswell: My point of order is simply that government members, and all members in fact, are responsible for addressing other members in this place with respect by using their correct parliamentary title. The government has been using on many occasions during this week an adjective prior to the Leader of the Opposition’s parliamentary title, which is completely unnecessary. There is a pattern of this behaviour.

The SPEAKER: I remind members to use the correct titles for members of Parliament.

Nick STAIKOS: Those opposite are only interested in fighting each other. They will never fight for those trying to enter the property market. Changing the ringmaster does not change the fact that it is still the same old Liberal Party circus.