The Greens still hold the keys to Albanese’s House
The last time Labor tried to call the Greens’ “bluff” on housing, they ended up forking out billions of extra dollars and were delayed by months on a key election promise. Now the Greens know they have a formula that works, they’ll be even less likely to relent until they get what they want.
The Greens will take the fight on negative gearing straight to the negotiating table with Labor, demanding “significant” reform in return for supporting the Federal Government’s “Help to Buy” scheme.
While there is no world in which Anthony Albanese rolls over and tells the electorate “Adam Bandt made me do it”, the Greens will be looking to weaponise the Prime Minister’s own rhetoric in their case for reining in tax concessions for property investors.
The economic circumstances have changed, the cost-of-living crisis is hurting even more Australians, or simply it’s “the right thing to do”.
If those reasons sound familiar, it’s because they’re precisely the ones Mr Albanese used to justify his backflip on the stage three tax cuts last month.
Labor has been careful not to completely close the door on changes to negative gearing, but insists the policy is not under consideration.
This is all the more incentive for the Greens to insist it very much be put on the agenda, a debate alone that would be a gift to the Coalition.
The government is far safer steering conversation toward other non-tax related housing policy, but the comparatively modest “Help to Buy” scheme is going to require a much bolder rethink to capture the support of the Greens.
Labor learnt this 12 months ago when it made a bad political calculation on housing. It then spent most of the year paying for it.
Back in February 2023, Labor was still fresh faced and on a mission to legislate its election promises as fast as possible.
None more so than its signature housing policy, the $10bn Housing Australia Future Fund (HAFF).
Enter the Greens, spearheaded doggedly on this issue by parliament newcomer Max Chandler-Mather. The minor party was not convinced the fund was big enough to make a dent in the housing crisis.
Without the support of the Greens, the government could not get the HAFF through the Senate, but despite this arithmetic Labor was confident it had a path.
The plan was a classic wedge.
As one Labor minister put it privately at the time, pushing ahead with a vote in the lower house would “scare” the Greens back onside for fear of appearing to be against more social and affordable housing.
Either the Greens would cave, or Labor would forever have a photo of the Greens MPs aligned with the Coalition voting no on $10bn for new homes.
The Greens ultimately abstained, not quite the finish the government had hoped for, but pictures of their empty seats at the time of the vote still did the rounds on almost every Labor social media account in the country that evening.
The government paid a lot for that photo op.
The HAFF ultimately passed in September last year, but not before Mr Albanese had committed a further $3bn for additional housing.
And not before the PM’s goading and commentary in press conferences and Question Time had positioned Mr Chandler-Mather as the default opposition spokesman on housing.
The young Greens MP, who has booked in a speech at the National Press Club next month, has already stepped up his attacks on the “Help to Buy” proposal.
By highlighting the comparatively small number of Australians it will help, some 40,000 in total, Mr Chandler-Mather is right back where he was a year ago arguing the HAFF wasn’t enough.
Nowhere is the cost-of-living crisis felt more than in the home, and in particularly among the Australians who don’t actually own the roof over their heads.
Housing is a strong contender for the defining issue of the next federal election, tangibly affecting more voters than almost any other area of policy. These extend from the millions of renters struggling to keep up with record increases and firsthome buyers losing bidding wars weekend after weekend, to the parents who rightly fear the so-called “Australian dream” is forever beyond the reach of their children.
Labor has put billions of dollars on the table for social and affordable housing, and dangled billions more in front of state premiers as an incentive to exceed their forecast new build rates.
The Coalition wants migration slowed and is offering first-home buyers the chance to dip into their superannuation to get into the property market.
Everyone agrees more land needs to be unlocked, but those levers unfortunately belong to the lower levels of government.
All the while the Greens are capitalising on renters’ angst in the inner cities and beyond, garnering widespread support as they continually hold out for a better deal from the government.