Greens Leader Adam Bandt has indicated that a partial concession from the government could persuade his party to support Labor’s housing bill after a week of deadlock in the Senate.
Bandt was asked on ABC’s 7.30 on Thursday night if some adjustments, could potentially secure the Greens’ support.
He said: “Capital gains tax concessions are a big part of the reason that so many renters and first home-buyers are getting locked out at the moment.”
Bandt said while the current housing and rental crisis is much more severe than it was two years ago, if changes could help these groups re-enter the housing market, it would be “incredibly popular for (Prime Minister) Anthony Albanese”.
“We’re prepared to work with them,” Bandt said.
“The housing and rental crisis is just breaking people at the moment.”
Bandt acknowledged Albanese’s willingness to reconsider his approach to the stage three tax cuts and urged him to do the same with housing.
But the federal government has been adamant it would not touch negative gearing or capital gains in its housing agenda negotiations.
Labor’s , which aims to help 40,000 first-home buyers with lower deposits through a shared equity program, has faced a two-month delay due to stalled negotiations with the Greens.
The bill is the second housing legislation to be delayed in the Senate this week after a tense debate saw the Build to Rent bill stalled for negotiations on Tuesday.
The Greens are arguing the Help to Buy bill will push up rent and house prices and say more protections are needed for renters and more funding is needed for public housing.
The Opposition’s Senate leader Simon Birmingham has criticised labour’s housing bill as a “bad policy”, and said that the focus should be on addressing the core issues affecting the housing market.
“Our view is, you’re better off focusing on the fundamentals to actually get the cost of building houses down, get the ability to develop them up, and control and deal with population pressures, rather than this dubious billion-dollar government scheme,” he said.
The Greens, the Opposition, and some crossbenchers on Tuesday that would have enabled the Help to Buy bill to be brought to a vote.
The Senate on Wednesday voted to defer a vote on the bill until 26 November.
But Albanese then vowed to re-introduce the Help to Buy legislation in October.
The prime minister has threatened a double dissolution election — which he — if his government cannot pass its housing agenda. However, political pundits believe such a move is unlikely.
Source Agencies
