‘Irresponsible’ to boost immigration without more new homes, industry bodies warn
A push for as many as two million new migrants for Australia in the next five years could lead to a “housing price catastrophe” in NSW, industry bodies have warned.
NSW
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Opening the post-Covid floodgates to immigration without boosting the amount of housing available is “irresponsible” and could lead to a “housing price catastrophe”, industry bodies have warned.
In a year in which the average house price in Sydney has risen by $300,000, those looking to crack the market could face renewed pain amid discussions to ramp up immigration in a move predicted to place more pressure on the state’s dwindling housing supply.
“We’ve always said we need immigration for the purposes of boosting the economy – if we’re going to recover from Covid-19 and all the associated debt, we need to boost our population,” Urban Taskforce CEO Tom Forrest said.
“But, the big constraint is the NSW planning system and housing supply.”
It comes amid reports of top NSW bureaucrats pushing for as many as two million new migrants for Australia in the next five years.
The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry earlier this week called for skilled migration to nearly double to 200,000 people a year, in a bid to aid the country’s Covid-19 recovery.
Any increase in demand for housing could lead to a price “catastrophe”, Mr Forrest said.
“If we’re going to avoid a housing price catastrophe, we urgently need the planning system delivering greater housing numbers,” he said.
“This is a major issue facing the Premier of NSW and it requires leadership from the top of the planning tree.
“You can’t have immigration without boosting housing supply – that would be irresponsible.”
The most recent data from the Australia Bureau of Statistics shows that 50,083 overseas migrants settled in Sydney in 2019-20, behind only Melbourne.
For the past two years the net highest number of migrants have settled in the Parramatta-Rosehill area, with 1800 overseas arrivals in 2019-20 and 2600 in 2018-19.
Amid Sydney’s skyrocketing housing market, the average house price in Parramatta grew by $60,000 from 2019 to 2020.
Liberal MP Jason Falinski, the chair of a federal inquiry into housing affordability, said young Australians already couldn’t buy homes due to a lack of supply.
“Australia was built on the back of migrants. We stand here today on the shoulders of those who came before us,” he said.
“But … Australians are genuinely annoyed that governments have not increased public infrastructure at the same pace as population growth.
“Young Australians cannot buy into the housing market because of lack of supply.”
The latest housing data released by the NSW Department of Planning shows just 29,785 homes were built in Greater Sydney in the 2020-21 financial year, below the NSW Government’s own targets which state up to 40,000 new homes are needed every year in Sydney until 2041.
NSW Planning Minister Rob Stokes said talk of increased migration meant “we need to have a mature discussion across all levels of government in order to develop a coherent policy around our population strategy”.
“These decisions have major implications for Sydney and Melbourne, where many new migrants desire to live and have significant impact on how we plan for our city and State‘s growth,” he said.
“There are Federal Government policies on all kinds of things, but we don’t have one on people.
“Without a population policy, the states are left to largely plan for their futures in the dark.”
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