Anthony Albanese has challenged the Greens to vote against Labor’s shared equity scheme for housing, rebuffing the minor party’s demands to horse-trade in return for cutting housing tax concessions.
On Sunday the prime minister said the government would put its help-to-buy legislation to parliament, where “the Greens can vote for it, or they can vote against it”.
“It’s as simple as that,” Albanese told reporters in Nowra after the New South Wales Country Labor conference.
The comments signal Labor may seek to call the Greens’ bluff and avoid a second round of fractious negotiations over housing by putting the bill to a vote without having secured a guarantee of support.
In 2023 the Greens voted with the Coalition to delay the Housing Australia Future Fund (Haff) prompting threats from Albanese of a double dissolution election.
The Haff bill passed in September after the government agreed to invest $3bn more in social and affordable housing, which the Greens claim proves withholding their 11 Senate votes can help win demands which now include a nationally coordinated rent freeze and cuts to negative gearing and the capital gains tax concession.
Labor’s help-to-buy scheme would help 10,000 prospective buyers a year by the government taking equity of 30% (for an existing build) or 40% (of a new build) in their homes, meaning smaller deposits and loans for the owner’s share.
On Sunday Albanese claimed that “people are seeing through the Greens, where they offer nothing positive”.
“On this issue, on help-to-buy, we’ll literally help Australians into home ownership by having a shared equity scheme that works successfully, in WA, in Victoria, here in New South Wales, our … scheme will allow for up to 40% of shared equity being taken by the commonwealth,” he said.
Albanese claimed the Greens “won’t talk about this particular legislation” because they want to “talk about something else”.
“Well, just like they held up support for increased investment in social homes, in public housing, and affordable housing, now they’re saying they’re going to hold up increased home ownership.”
“We have a comprehensive plan for housing, they just have slogans.”
On Saturday the Greens housing spokesperson, Max Chandler-Mather, told Guardian’s Australian Politics podcast the help-to-buy scheme “will actually make the housing crisis worse for 99.8% of renters”.
“That’s because every year, only 0.2% of renters would be able to access the government scheme,” he said. “And for every other renter trying to buy a home, this will push up the price of housing, even marginally.”
“The reality is you’re just not going to fix the housing affordability crisis while the government is dishing out something like $39bn a year in tax handouts for property investors that allow them to beat up the price of housing and lock out so many first home buyers.”
At the 2022 election the Coalition opposed Labor’s help-to-buy scheme, arguing that homeowners will be “forced to sell” if a pay rise pushes their income above the eligibility threshold of $90,000 for a single or above $120,000 for a couple.
