“This week, an important man passed away. He died alone, on a park bench, on a freezing Sydney night, one of the 105,000 rough sleepers in Australia, one of over 800 in the City of Sydney alone.” Having found his body, Laura, from our city’s Wayside Chapel, reminded us of the adage that you can judge a city by the way it treats its poorest citizen.
As the only Labor Councillor on the City of Sydney Council, his death indicated to me that I’m failing. His death, and indeed his life, should be a reminder to us all that we can all do better.
Friends, this economics chapter, and this amendment, offers us all a way to do better. It offers us a way to show that Labor believes every Australian has a fundamental right to an adequate standard of living, including access to a safe, secure, habitable and affordable home.
Australia is party to seven international human rights treaties upholding this right to appropriate housing. But increasingly in our cities and towns, the ability to access affordable housing is becoming downright impossible.
For over a century Labor has stood for building a fair society. In the 21st century, fairness and equity remain integral parts of Labor’s vision for our communities. Housing is one of the greatest challenges facing this vision. This profound inequality affects us all.
But this challenge is not unforeseen. Housing affordability has been the focus of media, experts and government inquiry for some years. And the role that negative gearing plays has been singled out for particular focus.
Negative gearing and capital gains tax concessions cannot be held solely responsible for housing market distortions but they are a key reason why affordability continues to decline.
There is no simple fix. But this amendment, with its commitment to review negative gearing and capital gains tax if Labor is elected to government, is a step in the right direction for the future.
Just as economic growth does not automatically lead to more economic justice and poverty reduction, growth in the number of houses does not automatically lead to more affordable housing. Supply alone is not the answer.
This week, a few hundred metres from where Sydney’s nameless rough sleeper passed away, I visited Blue Chilli, one of Australia’s best incubators for new start-ups.
They currently have a $10 million angel investment fund, one of only 13 in Australia. They are well on their way to supporting 100 new start-ups by 2016. To grow and create more jobs into the future, they need to see negative gearing wound back to free up private capital for greater investment in these start-ups. We are in the midst of a system that is broken, facing a series of unprecedented challenges.
Labor must be honest about our role in the past in supporting negative gearing. But we must also be honest about the effect negative gearing is having, and will continue to have, in changing our cities, and not for the better. Our past must not limit our future – and we must roll back negative gearing to create a better future for us all.”
