On Thursday, 16 October 2025 I spoke in Parliament about the lack of social and affordable housing in Queensland and the worsening housing crisis.
You can read my full speech below or in the official Parliamentary record of proceedings (Hansard) here.
More than 2,000 children were homeless in Brisbane last year; that is 48 per cent more than in the previous year and about half of those kids are under four years old. We have to ask: why? It is because governments want house prices to keep going up. Here is how they are doing it: we will start with the Albanese government’s five per cent deposit scheme which has already sparked a scramble to buy in an overheated market but it is not ordinary renters who get a look in. Instead, investors rushed to buy up homes in September, knowing that the government’s
plan will push prices even higher.
In the three months leading up to September, Brisbane house prices rose 3.5 per cent. The median home price is now almost $1 million. Now let us break that down. With every month that passed, you needed an additional $10,000 to buy an average home in Brisbane, so people were absolutely sprinting to catch up but, meanwhile, the finish line is just vanishing into impossibility. So where do Brisbane renters find any hope now? Certainly not with the LNP. Its two per cent deposit scheme that we heard about earlier this year was flooded with more than 11,000 applications within a month. As far as we know, they are still offering only 1,000 places over two years—one-tenth of those people. The government says it will expand the scheme but here is the problem: again, it is a demand-side policy so if it is of any meaningful size at all it will just continue to inflate prices, but investors are cheering.
Last week the LNP ditched a requirement for 20 per cent affordable housing in the Woolloongabba priority development area because—get this—the developers did not like it. You are telling me that developers want to make the most profit they can? I mean, sure, it will leave people stuck, perpetually renting or sleeping in parks, but the developers do not like it so the LNP has kowtowed to them. Well, colour me shocked.
We have to ask: where is Labor on this? The Greens and especially the former member for South Brisbane, Amy MacMahon, fought tooth and nail to get even minimum affordable housing requirements for the Gabba. Now the LNP has ditched them and, as far as I can tell, we have not heard a peep from the local Labor members. As far as I know, they did not even make a submission on the proposal*. In fact, it was left to my council colleague, the Gabba ward councillor Trina Massey, and me to call for affordable housing minimums in the Gabba. Why is it only the Greens that are calling to mandate a higher proportion of public and affordable housing in these new developments? Why are we the only ones calling to regulate rent increases and to create a public developer? Our communities deserve better. The 1,230 families that were homeless in Brisbane last year deserve better. It is time to put profit aside and put affordability first.
(Time expired)
*The MP for South Brisbane has since advised that she did in fact make a brief submission on the Woolloongabba PDA, though it has not been shared publicly.