The Nationals will attempt to turn a crippling housing shortage across regional and rural Australia into a policy battleground in the lead-up to the next election.
Nationals leader David Littleproud told Australian Community Media that the party will bring forward a new "housing policy specific for regional Australia" to ostensibly improve and better target planning, supply and funding.
Meanwhile, Liberal shadow housing minister Michael Sukkar has also waded in with a "radical" idea to streamline regional housing infrastructure planning by removing state governments altogether.
Housing availability has long dogged regional Australian communities and the agriculture industry.
The situation however became exacerbated by the recent Covid-era tree-change trend, extreme weather events, inflation and geopolitical issues disrupting supply chains, delaying or cancelling building developments and triggering price spikes and input shortages.
However, Mr Littleproud laid blame for the current national shortage of suitable accommodation at the feet of state and local governments that "failed to plan by increasing supply."
"The Nationals will bring forward a housing policy specific for regional Australia before the election that will address the differences between metropolitan and regional markets," he said.
The recently-released 2024 State of Australia's regions report noted regional building approvals have been decreasing since August 2021.
Mr Littleproud suggested last August, when calling for the regions to be guaranteed a fair slice of the government's new housing funding, a preferred development model was for the state and federal governments to work closely with councils to develop "bespoke" area-specific housing plans and then directly fund the local governments to roll them out.
"The regions are where market failure exists and there is a lack of private capital, because of a lack of market tension, so that's where the funding should be going primarily," he said.
"The states have got a chequered history of signing up with vagaries and the Commonwealth just hands money over, but we don't get the outcomes we are asking for. We need to start seeing action before we cut the cheques."
Regional housing markets vary dramatically from metropolitan capital city markets and between regions and have suffered the unintended consequences of one-size-fits-all approaches.
Meanwhile, Planning Institute of Australia chief executive Matt Collins said 232 Australian councils, or 43 per cent, do not even have planners working within them.
RADICAL ACTION NEEDED
Shadow housing minister Michael Sukkar said the federal government working more directly with local governments and "to be blunt, to try and cut out the state governments where possible within the constraints of the Constitution" was key to solving "many" regional and rural housing supply challenges.
He said the Coalition would "be looking closely" at different ways to directly and co-fund the sort of enabling infrastructure, like powerlines, pipes, sewerage and drainage needed to connect essential services, that unlocks housing supply.
"As a housing minister in the previous government, I worked very hard to connect with, incentivise and encourage state and territory treasurers, planning and housing ministers, and others, to really embrace what was in their control and run with it, and it didn't happen," he told the recent Regional Housing Summit.
"At the same time, in working with local government, it became abundantly clear that every attempt of state governments to take more responsibility from local governments ended up working very badly, not just for local communities but also with fewer homes being delivered."
New Regional Australia Institute figures show regional median house price has recently jumped by 54 per cent and the rental vacancy rate has dropped to 1.2 per cent.
Localising decision-making and dedicated regional housing and housing infrastructure funding, in the Unlocking Regional Housing Bill and $2 billion Regional Housing Infrastructure Fund, have also previously been proposed by Indi Independent MP Helen Haines.
THE STATE OF PLAY
Labor's National Housing Accord sets a target of 1.2 million new, well-located homes over five years from 2024, and the Housing Australia Future Fund will facilitate 40,000 social and affordable homes as part of this.
It is also trying to navigate its shared equity, or housing help-to-buy, legislation through Parliament and has consistently promised a fair-share of new and appropriate housing for regional and rural Australia.
The success of its ambitious plans will, in fairness, likely take years to truly measure.
However, Boral boss Vik Bansal was last week bullish about the construction sector beyond 2024. The company is the nation's biggest building materials manufacturer and most accurate industry bellwether
The fear for regional stakeholders is that zones outside the peri-urban fringe will be put at the end of a long queue as developers and states work through a lengthy backlog of projects.
Because while a handful of new houses is a big deal for a small town, it is easier for government, and cheaper for developers, to build new headline-grabbing estates in cities.
The point-of-difference the Coalition appear set to prosecute is that only by removing the regions from the one-size-fits-all planning model, with autonomy of funding, can adequate new housing be guaranteed.
RAI chief executive Liz Ritchie said priority support was needed to build both one and two-bedroom accommodation in the regions to house essential workers.
"Our regions are gearing up to be the engine room of the nation's transition to net zero - however, housing will be the key barrier to this growth," she said.
Meanwhile, farmers have been driven by necessity to scratch out innovative and often overly elaborate ways to house workers, particularly in recent years.
The National Farmers Federation recently suggested that government could do worse than incentivise landholders, with financial benefits or easing of planning rules, to build housing on their farms, which have a "unique value proposition" of abundant land, access to water and, ordinarily, reliable power supplies.
