iscover
iscover 
In a bid to improve housing supply across the country, the Labor government introduced a two-year foreign buyer ban to prevent people outside Australia from purchasing existing homes.
Speaking to Sky News, O’Neil said that while no “silver bullet” to fix the housing crisis, it will help ease supply challenges.
“We are going to ban foreign ownership of existing property in Australia. This is an important move. It’s not a silver bullet to the housing crisis because there is no silver bullet,” she said.
“I really firmly believe that given the housing pressures that Australians are facing today, we need to orient the entire efforts of the Australian Government around security of housing for Australians and, wherever possible, home ownership for a broader range of young Australians.”
This ban is off the back of the $32 billion investment made to build more homes.
“We’ve got serious problems with housing in our country at the moment. And that’s why you’re seeing our government throw absolutely everything at this problem. We’ve got this $32 billion package where we’re building more homes, we’re trying to help renters, and we’re getting more Aussies into home ownership,” said O’Neil to ABC News Breakfast.
“There is the government’s drive to build our way out of the current housing crisis. If there’s one single reason why we have significant housing pressures being faced around the country, it’s because we’ve gone through a period of about 30 years now where Australian Governments at every level have not done enough to make sure that we’re building enough homes for Australians. So, the core of our policy is build, build, build.
“And we’re doing that through funding additional homes. We’re doing it through training, more tradies, we’re doing it through pushing the states to undertake planning reforms and other measures. So, this is a big and complex task. What the Prime Minister has done is sat down with the premiers and leaders across the states and territories and said that we’re going to set a national target of trying to build 1.2 million homes over a five-year period.”
Despite the ambitious target, figures have fallen short over the first six months of implementation.
Speaking to Sky News, O’Neil acknowledged the shortcomings: “You’re right, we do need to lift our construction numbers in order to meet that target. But what I would say is we need a galvanising goal to get the country engaged in this.
“What the Coalition has said, after nine years of doing absolutely nothing about this problem, three years of opposing all of our measures to try to address it, is that they are actually going to scrap a building target for the nation altogether and essentially go back to that retreated position where the Commonwealth has nothing to do with housing that’s what we saw for nine years under the Coalition. We have a different view. We’re going to be gutsy. We’re going to set big, bold targets for the country because big, bold initiatives are the only way that we’re going to get out of this mess that’s been created.”
James Glenday from ABC News posed the question as to whether the government had plans to reform capital gains tax or negative gearing, to which O’Neil replied: “No.”
“The reason for that is because we need to focus our efforts on building more supply. And I think your viewers would have heard the Prime Minister say really, really clearly that if we can’t prove that measures won’t interrupt supply, then we’re not going to proceed with them. So, that’s why a big focus – building, supporting renters, helping homeowners,” O’Neil said.
With an election coming up it’s likely housing will continue to play a crucial role in policy. Both Labor and Liberal will be fighting for votes and could lean on the housing crisis to push agendas.
Related: Can the ambitious target of 1.2m homes be met?
