You know who could fix our housing crisis? The Albanese from 30 years ago

The Advertiser

a day ago

With the unwavering confidence of a prime minister backed by a decisive mandate (from 34.6 per cent of voters?), Anthony Albanese has warned the incoming crossbench to "get out of the way and let the private sector build [more housing]."
That sector presides over a projected 262,000 home undershoot on the government's five-year target of 1.2 million new homes.
Rewind to 1996. In his first speech to parliament, a 33-year-old Albanese stated that his "democratic socialist" politics partly developed from his upbringing in public housing.
It is easy to conclude that Albanese was merely strumming the same air guitar version of democratic socialism to which some Labor Left circles still hold. This consists of entirely liberal platitudes about a more generous social safety net funded by higher taxes on the wealthy.
Worse, Albanese now appears to revel in occupying the political centre. This is a person who spent the lead-up to Labor's 2019 election defeat unmistakably positioning himself to outflank Bill Shorten from the right. During the recent election, Albanese declared: "I don't pretend to be a revolutionary. I'm a reformist."
Gough Whitlam admitted the same to Chairman Mao Zedong in 1973. But the scope and scale of Whitlam's fleeting three years in office contrasts jarringly with the near invisible size of the timid half-measures that have passed for reform under Albanese's Labor Party.
The current historical moment calls for nothing less than the democratic socialism to which the young Albanese laid claim.
Nowhere is this more evident than housing.
2636 construction companies were declared insolvent in the financial year to March. Large swathes of housing projects have stalled due to rising costs, despite having already received approvals. Some are already indirectly supported through Albanese's Housing Australia Future Fund.
The simple truth is that most of these-and many other potential-projects could move forward were they not contingent on the time-wasting web of competing private property developers, construction companies, and investors seeking ever more complex ways to recover costs plus a rate of return.
Unlike for-profit businesses, government-owned corporations (such as Australia Post) can run on a break-even basis, or at a loss. This means housing construction can in principle be undertaken by government at lower cost.
There are limits to how much indirect government support can be justified before the very need for private sector involvement is called into question. When these concessions become too generous, they look more like a direct transfer of public resources to boost private profits.
The government wants many more houses to be built. Yet when, for instance, construction companies fail in the market, they do not pay the social cost of losing yet more skilled construction workers to the unemployment queue, or the mining and manufacturing industries.
All of this suggests the need for a genuine democratic socialist housing plan. Simply put, the market is too slow, wasteful, and unpredictable.
Imagine the federal government starts by purchasing failing small to medium construction companies, and then controlling stakes in the large Australian construction corporations. Existing managers and workers could be reoffered their positions on Commonwealth salaries.
In parallel, the government could establish a federal property developer that is statutorily tasked with coordinating the construction of affordable public housing, guided by annual and five-year construction targets.
Federal government ministers in regular contact with state and territory counterparts could sit on the developer's board, enabling a more rational division of resources and workers between national and sub-national infrastructure projects.
How would this be paid for?
First, the economic research shows that this kind of arrangement would probably more than pay for itself through flow-on effects between industries.
Second, the profits of more successful large companies in the government's construction industry portfolio could be used to prop up loss-making companies.
Third, a major source of money is found in the portion of national income being paid out as rent for housing. This amounted to around $80.58 billion over the financial years 2021-22 and 2022-23 alone. The vast majority of this accrued to private landlords.
MORE OPINION:
As a federal property developer acquires more private land, a larger portion of these revenues could be freed up for reinvestment into public housing.
Is this not a recipe for cosy deals between the Labor government and unions, at taxpayers' expense? Well, again in his first speech to parliament, the young Albanese convincingly reassured us that he has "always been a strong advocate for a pro-active, efficient and dynamic public sector. The ideologically driven view that the public sector is a huge monolith which exhausts economic and human resources must be challenged."
Pro-housing supply crossbench parties in the upcoming 48th Parliament can and should introduce, scrutinise, and improve detailed legislation that makes these ideas real and constitutionally workable.
The jury is still very much out on whether these overtures would be enough to rekindle the democratic socialist spark of Albanese's youth. If not, he must answer to the almost two-thirds of voters who did not give the Labor Party their first preference. For many of these people, big ambition on housing is the order of the day.
With the unwavering confidence of a prime minister backed by a decisive mandate (from 34.6 per cent of voters?), Anthony Albanese has warned the incoming crossbench to "get out of the way and let the private sector build [more housing]."
That sector presides over a projected 262,000 home undershoot on the government's five-year target of 1.2 million new homes.
Rewind to 1996. In his first speech to parliament, a 33-year-old Albanese stated that his "democratic socialist" politics partly developed from his upbringing in public housing.
It is easy to conclude that Albanese was merely strumming the same air guitar version of democratic socialism to which some Labor Left circles still hold. This consists of entirely liberal platitudes about a more generous social safety net funded by higher taxes on the wealthy.
Worse, Albanese now appears to revel in occupying the political centre. This is a person who spent the lead-up to Labor's 2019 election defeat unmistakably positioning himself to outflank Bill Shorten from the right. During the recent election, Albanese declared: "I don't pretend to be a revolutionary. I'm a reformist."
Gough Whitlam admitted the same to Chairman Mao Zedong in 1973. But the scope and scale of Whitlam's fleeting three years in office contrasts jarringly with the near invisible size of the timid half-measures that have passed for reform under Albanese's Labor Party.
The current historical moment calls for nothing less than the democratic socialism to which the young Albanese laid claim.
Nowhere is this more evident than housing.
2636 construction companies were declared insolvent in the financial year to March. Large swathes of housing projects have stalled due to rising costs, despite having already received approvals. Some are already indirectly supported through Albanese's Housing Australia Future Fund.
The simple truth is that most of these-and many other potential-projects could move forward were they not contingent on the time-wasting web of competing private property developers, construction companies, and investors seeking ever more complex ways to recover costs plus a rate of return.
Unlike for-profit businesses, government-owned corporations (such as Australia Post) can run on a break-even basis, or at a loss. This means housing construction can in principle be undertaken by government at lower cost.
There are limits to how much indirect government support can be justified before the very need for private sector involvement is called into question. When these concessions become too generous, they look more like a direct transfer of public resources to boost private profits.
The government wants many more houses to be built. Yet when, for instance, construction companies fail in the market, they do not pay the social cost of losing yet more skilled construction workers to the unemployment queue, or the mining and manufacturing industries.
All of this suggests the need for a genuine democratic socialist housing plan. Simply put, the market is too slow, wasteful, and unpredictable.
Imagine the federal government starts by purchasing failing small to medium construction companies, and then controlling stakes in the large Australian construction corporations. Existing managers and workers could be reoffered their positions on Commonwealth salaries.
In parallel, the government could establish a federal property developer that is statutorily tasked with coordinating the construction of affordable public housing, guided by annual and five-year construction targets.
Federal government ministers in regular contact with state and territory counterparts could sit on the developer's board, enabling a more rational division of resources and workers between national and sub-national infrastructure projects.
How would this be paid for?
First, the economic research shows that this kind of arrangement would probably more than pay for itself through flow-on effects between industries.
Second, the profits of more successful large companies in the government's construction industry portfolio could be used to prop up loss-making companies.
Third, a major source of money is found in the portion of national income being paid out as rent for housing. This amounted to around $80.58 billion over the financial years 2021-22 and 2022-23 alone. The vast majority of this accrued to private landlords.
MORE OPINION:
As a federal property developer acquires more private land, a larger portion of these revenues could be freed up for reinvestment into public housing.
Is this not a recipe for cosy deals between the Labor government and unions, at taxpayers' expense? Well, again in his first speech to parliament, the young Albanese convincingly reassured us that he has "always been a strong advocate for a pro-active, efficient and dynamic public sector. The ideologically driven view that the public sector is a huge monolith which exhausts economic and human resources must be challenged."
Pro-housing supply crossbench parties in the upcoming 48th Parliament can and should introduce, scrutinise, and improve detailed legislation that makes these ideas real and constitutionally workable.
The jury is still very much out on whether these overtures would be enough to rekindle the democratic socialist spark of Albanese's youth. If not, he must answer to the almost two-thirds of voters who did not give the Labor Party their first preference. For many of these people, big ambition on housing is the order of the day.
With the unwavering confidence of a prime minister backed by a decisive mandate (from 34.6 per cent of voters?), Anthony Albanese has warned the incoming crossbench to "get out of the way and let the private sector build [more housing]."
That sector presides over a projected 262,000 home undershoot on the government's five-year target of 1.2 million new homes.
Rewind to 1996. In his first speech to parliament, a 33-year-old Albanese stated that his "democratic socialist" politics partly developed from his upbringing in public housing.
It is easy to conclude that Albanese was merely strumming the same air guitar version of democratic socialism to which some Labor Left circles still hold. This consists of entirely liberal platitudes about a more generous social safety net funded by higher taxes on the wealthy.
Worse, Albanese now appears to revel in occupying the political centre. This is a person who spent the lead-up to Labor's 2019 election defeat unmistakably positioning himself to outflank Bill Shorten from the right. During the recent election, Albanese declared: "I don't pretend to be a revolutionary. I'm a reformist."
Gough Whitlam admitted the same to Chairman Mao Zedong in 1973. But the scope and scale of Whitlam's fleeting three years in office contrasts jarringly with the near invisible size of the timid half-measures that have passed for reform under Albanese's Labor Party.
The current historical moment calls for nothing less than the democratic socialism to which the young Albanese laid claim.
Nowhere is this more evident than housing.
2636 construction companies were declared insolvent in the financial year to March. Large swathes of housing projects have stalled due to rising costs, despite having already received approvals. Some are already indirectly supported through Albanese's Housing Australia Future Fund.
The simple truth is that most of these-and many other potential-projects could move forward were they not contingent on the time-wasting web of competing private property developers, construction companies, and investors seeking ever more complex ways to recover costs plus a rate of return.
Unlike for-profit businesses, government-owned corporations (such as Australia Post) can run on a break-even basis, or at a loss. This means housing construction can in principle be undertaken by government at lower cost.
There are limits to how much indirect government support can be justified before the very need for private sector involvement is called into question. When these concessions become too generous, they look more like a direct transfer of public resources to boost private profits.
The government wants many more houses to be built. Yet when, for instance, construction companies fail in the market, they do not pay the social cost of losing yet more skilled construction workers to the unemployment queue, or the mining and manufacturing industries.
All of this suggests the need for a genuine democratic socialist housing plan. Simply put, the market is too slow, wasteful, and unpredictable.
Imagine the federal government starts by purchasing failing small to medium construction companies, and then controlling stakes in the large Australian construction corporations. Existing managers and workers could be reoffered their positions on Commonwealth salaries.
In parallel, the government could establish a federal property developer that is statutorily tasked with coordinating the construction of affordable public housing, guided by annual and five-year construction targets.
Federal government ministers in regular contact with state and territory counterparts could sit on the developer's board, enabling a more rational division of resources and workers between national and sub-national infrastructure projects.
How would this be paid for?
First, the economic research shows that this kind of arrangement would probably more than pay for itself through flow-on effects between industries.
Second, the profits of more successful large companies in the government's construction industry portfolio could be used to prop up loss-making companies.
Third, a major source of money is found in the portion of national income being paid out as rent for housing. This amounted to around $80.58 billion over the financial years 2021-22 and 2022-23 alone. The vast majority of this accrued to private landlords.
MORE OPINION:
As a federal property developer acquires more private land, a larger portion of these revenues could be freed up for reinvestment into public housing.
Is this not a recipe for cosy deals between the Labor government and unions, at taxpayers' expense? Well, again in his first speech to parliament, the young Albanese convincingly reassured us that he has "always been a strong advocate for a pro-active, efficient and dynamic public sector. The ideologically driven view that the public sector is a huge monolith which exhausts economic and human resources must be challenged."
Pro-housing supply crossbench parties in the upcoming 48th Parliament can and should introduce, scrutinise, and improve detailed legislation that makes these ideas real and constitutionally workable.
The jury is still very much out on whether these overtures would be enough to rekindle the democratic socialist spark of Albanese's youth. If not, he must answer to the almost two-thirds of voters who did not give the Labor Party their first preference. For many of these people, big ambition on housing is the order of the day.
With the unwavering confidence of a prime minister backed by a decisive mandate (from 34.6 per cent of voters?), Anthony Albanese has warned the incoming crossbench to "get out of the way and let the private sector build [more housing]."
That sector presides over a projected 262,000 home undershoot on the government's five-year target of 1.2 million new homes.
Rewind to 1996. In his first speech to parliament, a 33-year-old Albanese stated that his "democratic socialist" politics partly developed from his upbringing in public housing.
It is easy to conclude that Albanese was merely strumming the same air guitar version of democratic socialism to which some Labor Left circles still hold. This consists of entirely liberal platitudes about a more generous social safety net funded by higher taxes on the wealthy.
Worse, Albanese now appears to revel in occupying the political centre. This is a person who spent the lead-up to Labor's 2019 election defeat unmistakably positioning himself to outflank Bill Shorten from the right. During the recent election, Albanese declared: "I don't pretend to be a revolutionary. I'm a reformist."
Gough Whitlam admitted the same to Chairman Mao Zedong in 1973. But the scope and scale of Whitlam's fleeting three years in office contrasts jarringly with the near invisible size of the timid half-measures that have passed for reform under Albanese's Labor Party.
The current historical moment calls for nothing less than the democratic socialism to which the young Albanese laid claim.
Nowhere is this more evident than housing.
2636 construction companies were declared insolvent in the financial year to March. Large swathes of housing projects have stalled due to rising costs, despite having already received approvals. Some are already indirectly supported through Albanese's Housing Australia Future Fund.
The simple truth is that most of these-and many other potential-projects could move forward were they not contingent on the time-wasting web of competing private property developers, construction companies, and investors seeking ever more complex ways to recover costs plus a rate of return.
Unlike for-profit businesses, government-owned corporations (such as Australia Post) can run on a break-even basis, or at a loss. This means housing construction can in principle be undertaken by government at lower cost.
There are limits to how much indirect government support can be justified before the very need for private sector involvement is called into question. When these concessions become too generous, they look more like a direct transfer of public resources to boost private profits.
The government wants many more houses to be built. Yet when, for instance, construction companies fail in the market, they do not pay the social cost of losing yet more skilled construction workers to the unemployment queue, or the mining and manufacturing industries.
All of this suggests the need for a genuine democratic socialist housing plan. Simply put, the market is too slow, wasteful, and unpredictable.
Imagine the federal government starts by purchasing failing small to medium construction companies, and then controlling stakes in the large Australian construction corporations. Existing managers and workers could be reoffered their positions on Commonwealth salaries.
In parallel, the government could establish a federal property developer that is statutorily tasked with coordinating the construction of affordable public housing, guided by annual and five-year construction targets.
Federal government ministers in regular contact with state and territory counterparts could sit on the developer's board, enabling a more rational division of resources and workers between national and sub-national infrastructure projects.
How would this be paid for?
First, the economic research shows that this kind of arrangement would probably more than pay for itself through flow-on effects between industries.
Second, the profits of more successful large companies in the government's construction industry portfolio could be used to prop up loss-making companies.
Third, a major source of money is found in the portion of national income being paid out as rent for housing. This amounted to around $80.58 billion over the financial years 2021-22 and 2022-23 alone. The vast majority of this accrued to private landlords.
MORE OPINION:
As a federal property developer acquires more private land, a larger portion of these revenues could be freed up for reinvestment into public housing.
Is this not a recipe for cosy deals between the Labor government and unions, at taxpayers' expense? Well, again in his first speech to parliament, the young Albanese convincingly reassured us that he has "always been a strong advocate for a pro-active, efficient and dynamic public sector. The ideologically driven view that the public sector is a huge monolith which exhausts economic and human resources must be challenged."
Pro-housing supply crossbench parties in the upcoming 48th Parliament can and should introduce, scrutinise, and improve detailed legislation that makes these ideas real and constitutionally workable.
The jury is still very much out on whether these overtures would be enough to rekindle the democratic socialist spark of Albanese's youth. If not, he must answer to the almost two-thirds of voters who did not give the Labor Party their first preference. For many of these people, big ambition on housing is the order of the day.