“To address this the Federal, State and Territory Governments have committed to a ‘Housing Accord’ to build 1.2 million much needed homes over the next five years,” HIA Managing Director, Jocelyn Martin said today.

“HIA has welcomed this announcement, and our members stand ready, willing and able to build these homes.

“However, the current commentary and ‘threats’ on further changes to tax settings is acting as a significant deterrent to productivity and increasing housing supply.

“This is coupled with the uncertainty from interest rate rises, new complex industrial relations reforms on businesses, the introduction of widespread changes to the building code and layers of approvals and regulatory change.

“This is all coming together to substantially affect market confidence and is reflected in building activity data which is indicating decade low numbers for future new home construction.

“Building businesses are feeling swamped and heavily weighed down by this constant attack on changing rules and increasing complexity, and at a time when we need more skilled workers, we are seeing more people leave our industry than enter it.

“It is time all parts of Government came together, to work in a coordinated way to commit to providing stable and reliable policies, and measures to support and grow the building industry – with the ultimate goal of building these much-needed homes.

“New housing is already one of the most highly taxed and regulated sectors in the economy, and any further increases to tax settings or increased regulatory complexity would only make that situation worse and ultimately result in less homes being built.

“Increasing the supply of housing is the key to addressing affordability. This will involve adequate release of land for new dwellings, increasing the density of housing in metropolitan areas, unlocking further land and infrastructure investment in regional areas and supporting investment in new housing.

“The focus needs to be on how we get more slabs poured that will result in the keys getting in the front doors of buyers’ and indeed renters’ pockets quicker,” concluded Ms Martin.

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