Current at: 16 June 2006
Today's state Budget has made some inroads into addressing the housing crisis facing Tasmanians but fails to address some of the real issues eroding affordability.
HIA, Australia's peak residential building industry group, said it is encouraged by the reasonable state of Tasmania 's finances but cautioned against the over reliance on stamp duty, land tax and other property taxation.
"The tax impost on housing means that Tasmanian families on average now spends 20 per cent of their income to service a mortgage, while five years ago it was nine per cent," he said. "This has also had an impact on the first home buyer market which for the past 15 years was stable at around 18 per cent of all homebuyers and has now shrunk to 14 per cent.
"The commitment to abolish mortgage duty is welcome, and we encourage the Government to remove this nuisance tax in a much shorter timeframe than the four years suggested in the Budget."
HIA's Tasmanian Executive Director, Stuart Clues, said that while there are many positive aspects to the Budget, nothing has been done to address the state's dysfunctional planning system, a system that causes significant delays and additional costs to consumers and builders.
"A recent survey of HIA members showed the single biggest problem confronting them were delays in planning approvals and wildly fluctuating application costs, from one suburb to another. There are 45 different planning schemes in this state - one for every 10,000 people", Mr Clues said.
Mr Clues said the announcement that 700 affordable homes will be built over the next four years is good news. "We will be working with the Government to ensure that builders small and large are able to be part of this important initiative, he said.
Plans to boost funding to provide 340 new training places in TAFE colleges will go some way to easing the skills shortages in the housing sector.
"With all states agreeing to pursue vocational reform, we hope these funds will be used to adopt a more flexible approach to training and apprenticeships in the building sector beyond the traditional college system and support initiatives such as HIA's YouthBuild program," he said.
Tasmania's healthy budget position should allow the government to be bold in their plans for tackling planning delays and other issues that are limiting housing choice and opportunity.