I have repeatedly argued that the Albanese government’s record immigration program is the main cause of Australia’s housing shortage and rental crisis.
The Albanese government’s first federal budget in October 2022 projected that Australia’s net overseas migration would be 235,000 in 2022-23 and 235,000 in 2023-24:
Source: October 2022 federal budget
Instead, an unprecedented 980,000 net overseas migrants landed in Australia over the 2022 and 2023 calendar years, completely obliterating projections.
This migrant explosion happened under Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil’s watch.
O’Neil previously boasted that “truckloads” of immigration are the solution to most of Australia’s challenges:
“Immigration has been the special sauce in our national history”.
“We have never, in post-colonial Australia, met any national challenge or done anything economically viable without truckloads of it”.
And she delivered a volume of migrants that Australia had never seen before.
Hilariously, O’Neil repeatedly attacked the former Coalition government over its increase in temporary migrants, only to let the numbers explode to unprecedented levels under her watch:
As a result, residential property rents also exploded:
After failing so dismally on immigration and engineering the rental crisis, Clare O’Neil has been moved to Housing Minister. Why? Because she is good at political spin:
She [O’Neil] remains in cabinet and has now moved to minister for housing and homelessness — a portfolio that needed a stronger communicator at a time when anger about housing is at record highs.
The government believes the housing portfolio needs its strongest, sharpest public performer since the housing debate has been largely lost by Labor so far.
O’Neil has already promised to deliver more housing supply to solve the housing shortage that she created with her reckless immigration:
“Ousted Home Affairs minister Clare O’Neil has vowed to make her job as Housing Minister about “delivery, delivery, delivery”…
“I’m 43, but for people my age and very much anyone younger than me, this is often the defining issue in their life”, she said.
O’Neil has also fended off claims that Labor’s target of building 1.2 million homes over five years is an unrealistic fantasy:
“(It) is a challenge, but it’s a challenge we have to meet. This will be hard work, but it’s my No.1 focus as Australia’s new Housing Minister”, Ms O’Neil said.
“The simple fact is that we have a housing shortage. To fix this we need to build more homes, more quickly, in more parts of the country”.
Meanwhile, actual dwelling construction data from the ABS continues to worsen at the same time as the population continues to grow like a science experiment:
And a record gap has developed between population demand and new supply.
The Coalition’s fellow housing liar, Michael Sukkar, was quick to point out the hypocrisy:
“The newly minted Housing Minister – who is responsible for the record levels of migration – clearly hasn’t read her incoming brief when she claimed Labor is still on track to meet its 1.2 million homes promise”, he said.
If only spin could solve Australia’s housing crisis, then we would be in safe hands with Clare O’Neil.
The ugly reality is that opening the floodgates to immigration is far easier than coaxing the private sector to build a volume of homes that has never been achieved before.
The task is even more insurmountable when macroeconomic conditions are hostile to homebuilding, namely:
- The official cash rate of 4.35% is the highest since 2011, pressuring new home buyers and builders.
- Construction costs have increased by around 40% since the beginning of the pandemic.
- The residential building industry is competing for scarce labour and materials with government ‘big build’ infrastructure projects.
- Nearly 3000 construction firms collapsed in 2023-24, reducing capacity across the homebuilding industry.
But don’t worry, Albo from Marketing has put his best spin doctor on the job.
Below is a video version of this article.
