Australia’s housing crisis will continue for years if the government continues to focus on supply rather than rampant population growth fuelled by “sky-high” immigration levels, a lobby group has warned.
Sustainable Population Australia national president Peter Strachan said Labor was in denial about the main factor driving housing demand, and was blaming Australians for the crisis instead of having a reasonable debate about population.
Australian Bureau of Statistics figures released last week showed that the population has now surpassed 27.1 million with 83% of the growth due to net overseas migration, and Treasurer Jim Chalmers admitted on Sunday that his twice-revised migration target of 395,000 this year has been dwarfed by the actual numbers.
“The government’s focus is on supply while the demand side is ignored. The result is a diabolical housing crisis causing misery for renters and home buyers alike,” Mr Strachan said.
“Instead of doing something about population growth, all sorts of reasons are found to blame ordinary Australians for somehow causing this crisis.
“They say we have too much space in our homes and we need to increase the occupancy ratio. They say we are NIMBYs for resisting inappropriate development. They say we need to get used to living in shoddy high rise and don’t worry about green space. They say we need to lift restrictions on development, adding to urban sprawl and destruction of the natural environment.
“All of this just so these unprecedented levels of population growth can continue. It is absurd.”
Mr Strachan pointed out that even though the government was obsessed with supply-side solutions there were actually fewer homes being built than in preceding years.
“It will be impossible to reach the Albanese government’s target of 1.2 million new dwellings over five years. For that to happen, we need to be approving an average of 264,000 dwellings per year. In the past 12 months (to July 2024), 165,250 dwellings were approved, which is even lower than the 175,130 approvals in the preceding 12 months. We are heading in the wrong direction,” he said.
“The Urban Development Institute of Australia concedes that we are building less than we were five years ago and we are facing an ever-increasing housing supply gap.
“All of the supply side solutions, including social housing, require houses to actually be built. But this is not happening at anywhere near the rate required, due to a perfect storm of factors including: interest rates at a 12 year high; a 40% rise in construction costs since the start of the Covid pandemic; high rates of construction industry insolvency; and competition for materials and labour with big infrastructure projects.
Mr Strachan said the obvious solution was to bring down immigration to stop adding to demand.
“This can be done relatively quickly by adjusting immigration visa policies and targets,” he said.
“Why the government is not doing this is one of life’s great mysteries. But one thing is certain, if we don’t do it, this housing disaster will drag on for years.”
Header image: Prime Minister Anthony Albanese promising to build more home in Sydney, left, and pandering to the Sikh community in Melbourne, right (Facebook)
