Thursday, 4 December 2025

 Nicole WERNER (Warrandyte) (10:02): On this side of the house we believe in the great Australian dream. We believe that Victorians should be able to buy a place to call their own. As the Shadow Minister for Youth, I hear from young people all of the time that lament to me that no matter how hard they look or how long they save or how much they budget, they feel like the dream of buying their own home is dead and that it is impossible to get their foot in the property market. The reality is that under Labor, sadly, this is the case. Forty-two per cent of the cost of a new build here in Victoria is taxes, fees and charges from the Allan Labor government. Just yesterday we found out that Labor is slugging Victorians with yet another tax and that there will be a charge of $11,000 per new dwelling in the suburbs, a cost that will inevitably be directly passed on to new home buyers and renters.

It was the former Labor Premier Dan Andrews that famously said, ‘Nah, I’ve spoken to young people, and they do not really care about owning their own home.’ Labor may not believe in home ownership here in Victoria, but we sure do. On this side of the house we believe in young people and we believe in home ownership. Whether it is a dream of a quarter-acre block in the suburbs, a big plot of land in the regions or a townhouse in the inner city, we want to unlock the potential here in our state to get Victorians into their own homes. The Liberals and Nationals stand with Victorians and are here to restore the dream of home ownership for the next generation.