House of horrors
Both major parties insist they've got a solution on housing. But experts fear neither is prepared to do what it takes.
Many young and low-income families are haunted by the nation's affordability challenges. But economists widely believe neither Labor nor the Coalition’s housing policies will solve the problem. And with perceptions rising that they’ve walked away from reviving plans for genuine reform, the Greens and independents are circling.
It’s impossible to touch on this subject without a quick reminder that Labor suffered a shock loss at the 2019 federal election under Bill Shorten after the Coalition focused its attacks on proposed changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax. His successor Anthony Albanese immediately dumped those policies in opposition and has refused to touch them ever since, despite making housing a central plank of Labor's platform.
Former Labor senator Doug Cameron, now co-commissioner of the People’s Commission into the Housing Crisis, thinks negative gearing drives prices up but says his former party was bruised by its experiences in 2019.
“The scare campaign … obviously had an effect on Labor's appetite to deal with [housing],” he tells Capital Brief.
