“Strategic investment in key last mile infrastructure - such as roads, sewer, water, and essential services - will help bring forward housing developments and improve connectivity across communities. A strong financial commitment is needed and the Coalition’s commitment to establish a $5 billion housing infrastructure fund to accelerate delivery of up to 400,000 new homes would be a critical step toward unlocking new housing supply and supporting economic growth.

“Business values the continuation of the instant asset write-off but have indicated that in an environment where costs are increasing the current amount of $20,000 will not go far enough. The proposed expansion of the instant asset write-off to $50,000 recognises that business is doing it tough in an environment of escalating costs. This initiative would encourage investment, boost cash flow, and support businesses to grow, innovate and employ more Australians.

“Equally important is the Coalition’s focus on cutting red tape, including reforms to processes involving the National Construction Code (NCC). Reducing unnecessary regulatory burden will help lower construction costs, streamline project delivery, and minimise productivity losses that have constrained the building sector in recent years.

“The scale of this challenge was highlighted by the Productivity Commission’s December 2025 inquiry into creating a more dynamic and resilient economy, which found that while regulation plays add between $135,000 and $320,000 to the cost of a new house, and up to $175,000 to a new unit.

“Across the sector, this equates to an annual regulatory burden of around $28.6 billion - approximately 1 per cent of Australia’s GDP. These findings reinforce the urgent need for coordinated reform across all levels of government to reduce duplication, improve consistency, and boost productivity.

“HIA has long called for a comprehensive program of regulatory reform, including streamlining planning systems, improving the efficiency of building approvals, and ensuring that future changes to codes and standards are evidence-based, cost-effective and nationally consistent. It pleasing to see both the Government and Opposition recognise the importance of structural reforms to policy settings in this country to boost productivity and reduce regulatory burden such.

The importance of stable, reliable and well-calibrated migration settings aligned to Australia’s capacity to deliver homes, and infrastructure is missing from government policy currently. Accurately forecasting Australia’s population has been a failure of all previous governments. The Coalition’s commitment to better balance migration settings with housing supply is an important and pragmatic approach. 

“There is a need to establish a long-term, multi-decade national settlement strategy that aligns population growth with housing system design, infrastructure investment and labour market needs. This includes improving the distribution of population growth across the country, supported by targeted policies that enable jurisdictions to better plan for and accommodate growth.

“This must also include a better targeted approach to skilled migration to addressing Australia’s estimated shortfall of 83,000 tradespeople, which continues to constrain activity and delay new housing supply.

“Growing Australia’s domestic construction workforce must also remain a priority. HIA continues to advocate on the need for stronger support for employers to take on and retain apprentices, including reducing administrative burden, improving incentives, and ensuring training systems are responsive to industry needs. Industry was looking to see more ambition to support employers taking on apprentices which was absent from both the Government and Opposition.

“HIA welcomed the Coalition’s commitment to overturn Labor’s proposed changes to Negative Gearing and Capital Gains Tax. These changes will not build a single additional home and will most likely impact renters and young people trying to build wealth.

“Taken together, the Coalition’s Budget-in-Reply pushes for greater ambition to meet Australia’s housing targets and address the structural challenges facing the economy. Key amongst this is boosting the investment in enabling infrastructure and reducing regulatory costs to unlock more housing supply faster.

“HIA looks forward to working constructively with all sides of politics to progress reforms that strengthen productivity, support businesses, and deliver more homes for Australians,” concluded Ms Martin.

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