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One Nation Plan: Two-Year Grace Period for Non-Citizen Property Owners

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Under the One Nation plan, anyone that owns residential property yet isn’t an Australian citizen or permanent resident, will be given two years to sell their property back to an Australian. The two-year grace period will ensure there isn’t a flood of properties onto the housing market.

Let’s get Australians into affordable houses while keeping the market sound.

Transcript

Australians are rightly stunned and confused. Why are foreigners, people from other countries, allowed to buy real estate while Australians are made homeless and sleep on the street? China dominates foreign purchases of Australian real estate, snapping up the most of any country in the world. China snaps up houses and farmland across our country, yet Australians are banned from buying a house in China. Add to that Hong Kong, Taiwan, Vietnam, India, the United States and the United Kingdom. The list of countries that grab Australian real estate goes on and on. 

Australians are suffering through a housing crisis, a catastrophe. The average mortgage size has never been higher, with expensive repayments crushing household budgets. A house in Brisbane used to cost three times the average income. Now it’s 10 times. This combination of high house prices and high interest rates means the average Australian is paying more of their wage on mortgage repayments than a homeowner would in 1990, when the Reserve Bank of Australia’s cash rate was at 17 per cent. I’ll say that again. As a proportion of income, mortgages are more expensive today than when the RBA had rates at 17 per cent. 

The rental market in Australia is broken. Vacancy rates, a good measure of whether it’s even possible for people to find a rental, have been at crisis levels for years. The average rent for a house in Brisbane has gone from $467 a week in 2020 to $740. For a unit in Brisbane, rent has gone up from $381 to $587 in the same period, since 2020. What’s the government’s response to the hurt Australians are feeling trying to get into a house? Labor will keep letting foreigners buy residential real estate. 

While the Liberals signal they might do something about it, their proposal doesn’t go far enough. Peter Dutton doesn’t want to stop foreign ownership of real estate. He wants foreigners to be back here buying up the farm in two years. The Liberals’ temporary pause is not good enough. Australia needs a complete ban on foreigners owning houses in this country. The Liberals won’t do anything about the houses that are foreign owned right now—they can keep them. In 2017, ANZ estimated that foreigners owned up to 400,000 Australian homes. That’s enough for a million Australians to live in, and that number of homes can only have increased since then. 

One Nation would implement a true ban on foreign ownership. Under our plan, anyone that owns residential property yet isn’t an Australian citizen or permanent resident will be given two years to sell their property back to an Australian. The two-year grace period will ensure there isn’t a flood of properties onto the housing market. Let’s get Australians into affordable houses while keeping the market sound. When the Liberals would be opening back up purchases for foreigners, One Nation would be completing the greatest transfer of houses out of foreign hands and into Australian hands in history. In this debate, we will hear Labor senators get up and claim that foreign ownership is less than one per cent. We’ll hear them claim it’s foreign investment. That’s a lie. It’s ownership. And their numbers aren’t true. 

In that 2017 report I mentioned, ANZ said, based on Foreign Investment Review Board data, foreigners had purchased an estimated 25 to 35 per cent of new Queensland homes. Later in 2017, the government introduced a new annual vacancy fee for foreign owners of residential properties. You won’t believe this next coincidence. After the government started charging a fee on foreign owners, the number of foreign owners declaring themselves to the government dropped from between 25 and 35 per cent to one per cent. It was just like magic! When NAB asked real estate agents directly how many foreigners they were selling to, the percentages were in the double digits. That’s more than 10 per cent. We know that. It’s a fact. The New South Wales government has even recorded foreign purchases at more than double what the federal Labor government claims they are. It doesn’t matter what the real number is anyway. One foreign purchase is one too many while Australian families are sleeping on the street. 

Foreign ownership is one part of the housing puzzle. One Nation has comprehensive solutions to all of the levers we need to pull to get Australians into affordable houses. These including pausing immigration to reduce demand, abolishing GST on building materials, establishing five per cent fixed rate mortgages, enabling HECS debtors to get a loan and deporting 75,000 illegal residents now. 

On foreign purchases and ownership, we are clear. Only One Nation will implement a real, permanent ban on foreign purchases. Only One Nation will force foreign owners to sell their houses to Australians. Only One Nation will extend the ban on foreign ownership to our valuable farmland, to protect our ability to feed Australians first. Only One Nation can be trusted to truly put Australians first.

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High Immigration is Hurting Australians

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Australia desperately needs housing and population policies that prioritise Australians FIRST. Both the Liberal-Labor uni-party have been implementing massive immigration, opening the floodgates despite making Australians homeless.

Australia has reached a record 2.43 million temporary visa holders, excluding tourists, which translates to a need for up to a million extra houses.

During COVID, when our borders were closed, rental vacancies near universities increased, showing that fewer international students mean more homes for Australians. The truth is, some universities and private education/training providers are abusing the system, using student visas as a backdoor for work rights, and eventually staying in Australia permanently. Many on student visas work full-time illegally and send money back home, with remittances hitting a record $11 billion in 2023. The claim that international students are a major export is a lie, as most work to support themselves here.

Until housing and infrastructure catch up, immigration needs to be dropped to zero and we have to ban foreign ownership. You can only trust One Nation to put Australians first.

Transcript

Thank you to Senator Pocock for raising this issue. Australia desperately needs housing and population policies that work for Australians. The Labor government has no coherent or practical policies. Both chiefs of the Liberal-Labor unity party have been implementing massive immigration. It’s essentially: ‘Open the floodgates to arrivals, no matter how many Australians are made homeless.’ We need a policy that does the opposite and puts Australians first.  

Australia just hit a record level of temporary visa holders. Excluding tourists and other short-stay visitors, temporary visa holders in the country now number 2.43 million people. This blows the previous record of 1.9 million out of the water. That’s up to a million extra houses needed for these people. And 680,000 of these are international students—another record. This is putting untold pressure on the housing crisis. When the borders were closed during COVID, nearly all suburbs close to universities experienced higher rental vacancy rates. That means that when international students couldn’t come into the country there were more homes available for Australians. Now, who would have thought?  

The truth is that some universities and private vocational education and training providers are completely abusing the system. A student visa is more often seen as a backdoor way to get working rights in Australia and eventually staying here forever. Hundreds of thousands of people on temporary student visas end up illegally working full-time hours and sending the money back to their home country. Personal remittance flows out of Australia almost perfectly correlate with the number of student visa holders in the country. On the latest figures in 2023, the transfer of money out of Australia hit a record $11 billion—out of the country. We can only assume that it has increased since then. 

A particular lie is being peddled in this debate. That lie is that international students are one of Australia’s largest exports, at $40 billion a year. That figure assumes an international student arrives here on day one with all their money for course fees, rent, food and transport bills, and other spending already saved in their bank account. In reality most students end up working here for the money to support themselves and sending the remainder back home. The claim that international students are one of our biggest exports is simply not true because it is does not align with reality. Until housing and infrastructure catch up, One Nation will drop net immigration to zero. 

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Developers Locking Up Land

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In the middle of a housing crisis, developers are locking up land, waiting for it to get worse so they can sell it at higher prices.

While cutting immigration is the number one solution to the housing crisis, we also need to look at foreign-owned companies that seem to be waiting for house prices to get even more expensive before they build more.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: A car is the third-biggest investment cost of a person’s life, usually. Housing would be No. 2. Government is far and away the biggest cost during a person’s life. Let’s move on to housing. Are you doing any work in the property market in terms of land development? Some developers are acting like a cartel and keeping land locked away in the middle of a housing crisis, waiting for the demand get even bigger to raise their price. What are you doing in this space?

Ms Cass-Gottlieb: Our exposure will arise in mergers, and we reviewed what was voluntarily notified to us— a merger in terms of the function of masterplanned communities. It was an acquisition that brought together assets; Lendlease was selling some assets which went to Supalai. In relation to the Illawarra area, where we considered there would be too much concentration post the transaction, we required a divestiture in order to retain continuing competition. One exposure we have to this, and an important role we have, is merger control. With the reforms, if passed by the House, we will have much more visibility in relation to the transactions we need to look at. If we were to become aware of cartel conduct or reports of anticompetitive conduct, that would absolutely be within our enforcement remit against anticompetitive conduct. We do not have an overall supervisory function in relation to housing. It arises in relation to maintaining and promoting competition.

CHAIR: The committee advises that it is releasing the Productivity Commission; you go with our thanks.

Senator ROBERTS: Are you aware of any developers withholding land from the market to bump up prices?

Ms Cass-Gottlieb: I don’t believe we are aware of that, no.

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you.

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Australian Houses for Australians – Ban Foreign Ownership!

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The government says less than 1% of houses are bought by foreigners. I don’t believe them. State governments say it’s at least double that, real estate agents say it’s 10%!

I have been asking for detailed data on how they get to that number for 9 months now without answers. 

The government is hiding the true extent of foreign ownership from Australians while we’re in the middle of a housing crisis.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: My question is to the Minister representing the Treasurer, Senator Gallagher. Overwhelmingly, Australians don’t believe foreigners should be allowed to own residential property in our country. I first asked at Senate estimates in November last year how many potential foreign buyers the ATO is detecting through its data-matching program? The government failed to answer. In February, Senator Bragg asked and was given no answer. In June estimates, I asked again and did not get an answer. Answers to my questions on notice for how many potential foreign buyers are detected are now overdue, again. Minister, why is your government hiding from the Australian people the data on potential foreign buyers of residential property? And when will you actually answer the question I’ve been asking for nine months?

Senator GALLAGHER: I recall you asking these questions, Senator Roberts, and I understood they were answered at the time by officials when I was sitting at the desk. If there have been follow-up questions you have asked notice that have not been answered, I can certainly follow that up. I think the evidence we gave during Senate estimates was that foreign investment plays an important role in bolstering Australia’s housing stock and creating additional jobs in the construction industry. But it is monitored very closely for good reason. It is tightly regulated, with foreign persons generally requiring foreign investment approval before acquiring an interest in residential land, regardless of its value, with a few exceptions. Foreign investors make up a very small proportion of the total Australian residential property market, accounting for approximately 0.93 per cent of new and established dwelling purchase transactions in 2022-23. Out of 479,257 transactions, based on ATO data from 2022-23 only 4,463 transactions were by foreign investors. It is a very small component—less than one per cent—of new and established dwelling purchase transactions in the 2022-23 financial year. I think senators have raised this through estimates as something they are interested in—raising concerns about foreign investors squeezing out local residents from being able to purchase housing. But the evidence would show that it’s a very small component of the residential property market in the transactions that are being monitored, as was explained in estimates by the ATO. (Time expired)

The PRESIDENT: Senator Roberts, first supplementary?

Senator ROBERTS: The New South Wales state government reported more than twice the number of overseas purchases of property that the Foreign Investment Review Board recorded in 2021. The board claims foreigners buy less than one per cent of residential property—and you just confirmed that. Yet in the first quarter NAB property survey, real estate agents say they’re selling 10 per cent of Australian housing to foreigners. Minister, if you have confidence in the Foreign Investment Review Board, why won’t you hand over the data?

Senator GALLAGHER: Again, I’m not sure which part of the data hasn’t been answered. I was sitting at estimates when you were given figures, Senator Roberts, so I’m not sure which data is the data you’re seeking. The ATO data I just read out—and I can provide this in writing to you—shows that it is 0.93 per cent for the 2022-23 financial year, and that it has come down, as I understand it, from a peak in 2015-16. The ATO do residential real estate compliance investigations—so they follow this up and check that people are compliant with the requirements of foreign ownership of residential property. They identified 428 properties for compliance, they did 410 investigations and found 145 properties in breach, and 55 of those resulted in— (Time expired)

The PRESIDENT: Senator Roberts, second supplementary?

Senator ROBERTS: Minister, you want foreign investment, yet foreign ownership is against Australians’ interests. Minister, this country is in a housing crisis. When will you ban foreign ownership of residential real estate and put Australians in Australian houses first?

Senator GALLAGHER: We’re not going to do that, Senator Roberts. The numbers show we need good strong rules around it, and there are strong rules around it. We need compliance with those rules, and there are good compliance processes. It’s less than one per cent, and this country has benefited from foreign investment. We benefit in terms of our economy and in terms of jobs—

Senator Whish-Wilson interjecting—

The PRESIDENT: Senator Whish-Wilson, order! Please continue, Minister.

Senator GALLAGHER: So it isn’t something we are seeking to ban. It would help if some of our housing programs, which are currently stalled in the Senate, were given approval by the Senate because then we could build more supply, which is the actual issue. I know there wants to be a lot of distractions about who’s to blame, and it’s easy to blame foreign ownership. The statistics don’t support that. I say to the Senate that there are a couple of bills that are stuck in this chamber that would help people into home-ownership and help increase the supply of housing in this country, and I say: let’s get on with that job

Questions on notice from 17 June 2024. Still unanswered and overdue as of 21 August 2024

Q0214_Economics_2024-25Budgetestimates_TreasuryDownload
Q0212_Economics_2024-25Budgetestimates_TreasuryDownload
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How Many Foreign Buyers Are Really Snatching Up Australian Homes?

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Since November, I have been trying to get a very simple answer out of the Australian Taxation Office (ATO): How many potential foreign buyers are they detecting?

The ATO runs a data matching program that checks the details of more than 2.4 million sellers and buyers to detect if they might be foreign.

The ATO claims only 1% of purchases are foreign, but they won’t tell me how many of those 2.4 million matches they get are flagged as potentially foreign. Watch as they again refuse to tell me how many foreigners they identify in the 2.4 million records.

They claim to have manually checked over 230,000 records every year that can’t be automatically matched to confirm whether they are Australian. With other evidence like the NAB property survey indicating up to 11% of new housing stock is purchased by foreigners, I believe the ATO figures are completely understating the level of foreign buying in the country.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you for appearing again tonight, and congratulations to you, Mr Heferen. I don’t think we’ve seen you since your appointment. My first question is about foreign buyers of real estate. Radio 2GB reported in April that foreign buyers accounted for 11 per cent of newly built homes in the final quarter of last year. This is a disaster for Australian homebuyers. Can you please provide that data for each quarter over the previous 12 months—the proportion of newly built homes bought by foreigners?

Mr Thompson: I think the 2GB article would have been using the National Australia Bank—

Senator ROBERTS: That’s my understanding.

Mr Thompson: As I think I’ve talked about at the committee before, there are a number of differences between the National Australia Bank survey and our data. So the National Australia Bank’s data is from a survey,
so it asks real estate and other real estate professionals to estimate. I think the exact question in that survey is about overseas buyers. Our numbers are coming from state and territory land title offices, which are matched
against Home Affairs data and Australia Electoral Commission data. There is a very significant gap between the numbers that appear in that survey and the numbers that we get. Our numbers are based on the definition of a foreigner under the Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Act. I think last week we released the 2022-23 numbers, which would put the estimate at around one per cent.

Senator ROBERTS: Moving onto the first home super saver scheme, I’m quoting from the eligibility requirements in guidance note 2018/1: There is no requirement for you to be an Australian citizen, Australian resident or an Australian resident for taxation purposes. Why are we allowing foreigners—not even residents for taxation purposes—access to this scheme, which is meant to be for getting Australians into their first home?

Mr Heferen: That would be a policy question for our colleagues at the Treasury.

Ms Brown: It is a policy question for Treasury, but the appropriate group for it to be directed to is markets group. That is administered by our Retirement, Advice and Investment Division in markets group. We can take it on notice and have them provide a reply.

Senator ROBERTS: I want to come back to foreign ownership again. I refer to table 3 of the answer to question on notice SBE106 from the November estimates. Through the Department of Home Affairs visa data-
matching program, how many of the real property transfer report entities records that are automatically matched to ATO records are foreign?

Mr Thompson: As we’ve answered previously, we’re not able to—the question was, ‘How many do we automatically match?’ and ‘How many do we have to go away and do additional things to match?’

Senator ROBERTS: I’m coming to that.

Mr Thompson: If you think about it coming through the system: if it’s an exact match, that’s all automated. There would be a range of circumstances where we don’t get an automatic match. It could be that the date of
birth’s the wrong way. It could be a maiden name. In those circumstances, we have additional processes to match. We work down through every record. In the automatic matches, there will be some foreigners. In the ones we can’t automatically match, there will be some foreigners.

Senator ROBERTS: What percentage?

Mr Thompson: At that point—

Senator ROBERTS: You can’t tell us?

Mr Thompson: The numbers in that answer to the question on notice were addressing how many we automatically match versus how many we perform additional—

Senator ROBERTS: Correct. How many that were matched were foreigners?

Mr Thompson: If the question is about the compliance results that we get, they’re published—

Senator ROBERTS: My question is: what percentage of buyers are foreigners?

Mr Thompson: One per cent.

Senator ROBERTS: Could you provide to me on notice the numbers of foreign buyers for the last five years.

Mr Thompson: We publish that. I’ve got the latest public—

Senator ROBERTS: Okay, if you could take it on notice for the last five years.

Mr Thompson: I’ll take it on notice.

Senator ROBERTS: From table 4, immediately below that from the same question on notice from November estimates, how many of the entity records that were not able to be automatically matched to ATO records remain unverified or unresolved?

Mr Thompson: None.

Senator ROBERTS: How many unmatched records from the data-matching program remain unresolved from 2018 to date?

Mr Thompson: I think that’s the same question.

Senator ROBERTS: I want to go right back to 2018.

Mr Thompson: I’ll take that one on notice.

Senator ROBERTS: How many residential properties in Australia are owned by foreigners today?

Mr Thompson: I think that is the question around the register.

Senator ROBERTS: I just want to know how many foreigners own real estate. We’ve got a housing crisis. We’ve got people in Brisbane and all up and down the east coast of Queensland in major provincial cities sleeping under bridges and in cars, taking families home.

Senator Gallagher: Yes, but I think it’s very simplistic to say that that housing shortage is a result of foreign investment in residential housing. We’ve had a number of hearings where you’ve been told how relatively low that level is in comparison to non-foreign owned.

Senator ROBERTS: I’d like the exact numbers.

Senator Gallagher: And we’ll provide that number to you, but the link that you are saying—that foreign ownership of properties equals some of what you’ve been talking about and is a real issue in Brisbane—is not
right. The issue is supply. We’ve got to build more houses for people, not blame foreigners for it.

Senator ROBERTS: I’ve never said it’s entirely due to foreigners, but that is one—

Senator Gallagher: We need to make sure that the rules are tight, that there are restrictions in place, which there are, so that that arrangement works properly. But it’s not fair to say that the housing crisis is because we’ve got some small foreign-owned investments.

Senator ROBERTS: I didn’t say that. I said that’s one contributing factor.

CHAIR: I’ll just do some committee administration here. I’ll table three documents—the three articles referenced by Senator O’Neill earlier. The committee has agreed to a time management plan to conclude
questions, so last question, Senator Roberts.

Senator ROBERTS: I’d like to make the point that the witnesses have provided answers so late, in the past, that they’ve been distributed at 8 pm on the day before they appear in Senate estimates, 100 days after the last
hearing, and failing to raise any public interest immunity claims on answers they don’t give. That’s a clear frustration of the committee’s work.

Senator Gallagher: We will try and do better, Senator Roberts. We have had a long discussion about the number of questions on notice which are coming in and having to be managed by departments, but I agree: it’s an important accountability measure, and departments should work to meet the timeframes.

Senator ROBERTS: When it’s 100 days, it’s way late, and then it suddenly comes in at 8 pm on the night before.

Senator Gallagher: Yes. I understand your frustration.

Daily Telegraph Article: Foreigners buying homes at twice the rate claimed in official figures, according to real estate agents and state tax data

Foreigners buying homes at twice the rate claimed in official figures, say real estate agents and state tax data | Daily Telegraph

Answers to Previous Questions on Notice

SQ23-000665 SBE054 – ATO – Foreign buyer crackdownDownload

SQ23-000661 SBE106 – ATO – Data matching program for Title DeedsDownload
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