Wednesday, 18 March 2026

 Richard RIORDAN (Polwarth) (10:34): I rise this morning to make some comments about the supply of homes in regional Victoria inquiry report that was produced in November 2025. The supply of homes in regional Victoria, like the supply of homes right around the state, is in a pretty bad state at this point in time. Homes have become increasingly unaffordable, rentals are becoming in shorter supply, and the question all Victorians are asking is: why on earth, in a country so blessed with land and opportunity, is it so hard now to get a home? Relative to the position that we find ourselves in, this country is one of the highest income countries in the world per capita, and by and large we are very fortunate for where we can live and how we can operate.

This is an important inquiry that the Parliament did, but unfortunately it has not really nailed some of the issues, to my mind. I want to talk this morning specifically on the supply of homes in parts of my electorate, being the Surf Coast shire and the Colac Otway shire in particular, because between the Surf Coast and the Colac Otway shires they have the bulk of the Great Ocean Road, and in that it is one of the highest levels of short-stay accommodation available in that region. The government and this report go into some detail talking about the short-stay levy. This government unfortunately has mistakenly thought that if we charge the person more who is staying in the accommodation that will somehow be a perverse incentive to stop people staying in short-stay accommodation. Of course nothing could be further from the truth. All that effectively does is put a tax on holidays. This report highlights it too in fact, where it is referred to here as a new tax measure to help pay Homes Victoria. So the government is selling it on one hand to the community that this tax will in fact put more homes on the rental market, while this report actually identifies that the government is looking to raise around $60 million a year, which they plan to give to Homes Victoria in the hope they can build some more homes. The ability of Homes Victoria to create more homes is a debate for another day. We just note that since this report was released in November 2025 some 2000 extra families now find themselves on the homeless waiting list. Throughout this government’s Big Housing Build and its endless talking about the housing crisis, it in fact continues to get worse.

We are talking about how difficult it is along my part of the world on the Great Ocean Road in Polwarth, but specifically about the effect that has on worker accommodation. So why does the housing market in that area, with a high amount of short-stay accommodation, have a problem? Is it the short-stay accommodation that has caused the problem? Or is it the tax levers that this government now pulls that are making it more difficult – or the regulatory burdens, if you like? The real estate agents and those handling properties in my region – and I have talked regularly to operators in Torquay and along the coast, from Lorne through to Apollo Bay – say there has been variously between a 30 and a 50 per cent reduction in long-term rental availability in these communities. That quite simply has come about because the government’s land tax grab has continued to rise year in, year out, and this year many people saw COVID levies thrown in as well. There are many holiday homes and parcels of land that once had pretty low-cost accommodation on them that are finding themselves paying $10,000 to $50,000 per year. You just cannot recoup that sort of tax out of long-term rentals; you can only do it through short-term rentals. So what this government has essentially done is it has driven long-term housing to the short-term property market, to the short-stay accommodation market and from there it has put the levy on to create a tax. The government has used property taxes to distort the market and then take advantage of it through the short-term levy, which is a great disappointment.

For all the talk of this government and for all the effort that has gone in, and there is some quite useful information in this supply of homes in regional Victoria report, unfortunately it does not address the situation that in many parts and in other areas identified – Hepburn shire and other tourist areas – it is in fact the short-stay levy and the perverse land taxes that are driving housing affordability and supply down.