The Nationals leader and Member for Murray Plains, Peter Wash, has dismissed today’s Allan Labor government announcement about more homes for Victoria as a farrago of fantasies – and blatant, headline grabbing lies.
Mr Walsh says just 12 months ago the Labor government was promising Victorians 800,000 new homes – at the rate of 80,000 a year – and he’d like to know where they are.
And he says, “as always with Jacinta Allan, regional Victoria did not get a mention”.
“As Premier Allan lurches from crisis to crisis, she seems convinced more spin, more smoke and mirrors and more lies will distract the public from the abyss into which she and her government are tipping Victoria,” Mr Walsh says.
“And if you can wend your way through the digital labyrinth you eventually find regional Victoria is a footnote in this latest Allan ‘fast-track’ to alleviate Labor’s decade of failing to address social housing at any level,” he says.
“Today Ms Allan says she is setting a regional target of 425,600 new homes by 2051 – a far cry from the 2033 target of the last year’s much vaunted Affordability Partnership and its 800,000 homes. Her timelines are as rubbery as her promises.”
Mr Walsh says the saviours of regional housing are the local builders, tradies and families investing in their own futures.
He says companies such as Swan Hill’s Swanbuild, which he has recently visited again, are driving the regional housing agenda.
“Despite the lack of any serious investment/support/concessions in the regional housing industry, companies such as Swanbuild are growing, having expanded to Bendigo as well – perhaps the Allan Labor government needs to talk to people who actually know how to get things done to budget and on time,” he added.
“Instead of crippling the small investors who have dared invest in their own futures with a second property, which is now being taxed out of their capacity to pay.”
Mr Walsh says the only germ of truth he can find in any of the information released is the Allan Labor government Planning Minister Sonya Kilkenny conceding the fast-tracked strategy will involve stripping councils of planning powers in Labor-designated property hotspots.
Ms Kilkenny explained Labor concentrating more power in its hands as “incremental change that sets Victoria up for the next generation, so we can have more opportunities for young people”.
He says the only legacy the Allan Labor government is guaranteeing the next generation, and the one after that, and possibly well into the next century, is Australia’s biggest state debt.
“That debt is currently around $160 billion and has a long way to go under this mockery of fiscal management – Labor can’t manage money, Labor can’t manage the economy, and every Victorian is paying the price with this staggering multi-generational financial black hole,” Mr Walsh explains.
“Just as it has stripped property rights from our farmers so it can ram through its already failed sustainable energy strategy, now it is trying to offset its housing crisis by telling people across Melbourne, indeed people everywhere, that if you get in the way of Labor it will simply change the laws and leave you without any protection,” he adds.
“Jacinta Allan, Labor and their CMFEU allies don’t give a damn about your rights, your dreams or your future so long as they can keep filling their pockets with your taxpayer dollars.”
CAPTION:
The Member for Murray Plains, Peter Walsh, with Swanbuild directors Craig and Josh Perryman in the work yard of the Swan Hill modular home business.
