BCA calls for council reforms to fix housing crisis
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The news: The Business Council of Australia (BCA) is pushing for a range of reforms to planning approval processes to address the nation’s housing crisis.
BCA CEO Bran Black has called for state governments to be empowered to strip underperforming local councils of their authority in assessing building applications.
The business lobby group also proposed measures to speed up decision-making, including a state government "concierge service" and report card-style tracking of council performance.
The numbers: There was a 64,000 new built home shortfall last year, which needs to be overcome to meet the government’s target of 1.2 million new homes, the BCA said, with slow planning approvals worsening inflation through increased housing costs.
It said current housing approvals are particularly falling short of targets in low-performing areas.
The context: Australia reportedly needs to be building 9 properties for every 1,000 people per year but only achieves six.
On a state-by-state basis, Northern Territory had the lowest approval rate with only 1.4 properties per 1,000 residents, numbers from the BCA show. The ACT leads with 9.6 homes per 1,000 people as of March 2024, and Victoria performs best of the larger states with 7.5 homes approved per 1,000 people.
The push from the BCA is the first part of a wider campaign that will be accompanied by a yet-to-be-released housing report called ‘It’s time to say yes’.
What they said: “We have a housing supply crisis in Australia and we need to turbo-charge the assessment and approval process so we get more homes built faster,” Black said.
“This supply crisis, driven by a shortfall, means demand for limited houses further pushes up prices and rents, driving higher inflation which hurts all Australians.
“Plain and simple, we need more supply, and we want to work with local and state governments to speed up their housing decisions, so builders can get on with the job of delivering places for people to live.”
The source: BCA media release
