Dastyari called a housing snob over video

The Sydney family whose home was mocked by Labor sen­ator Sam Dastyari have labelled him a ‘snob’ after politician’s bizarre foul-mouthed video.

Sam Dastyari on what $1m buys in Sydney.

The western Sydney family whose home was mocked by Labor sen­ator Sam Dastyari have labelled him a “snob” after the politician filmed a bizarre foul-mouthed video on housing affordability.

Their response comes after Senator Dastyari revealed yesterday that he used part of his taxpayer-funded communications allow­ance to produce social media videos and target online views and clicks.

• UPDATE: Coalition frontbencher hits out at ‘tasteless’ video

In a video posted on Facebook over the weekend, Senator Dastyari travelled to western Sydney suburbs on the “Bill Shorten bus”, inspecting homes with sale price estimates of $1 million.

“Everybody loves talking about house prices, but what does a million bucks in Sydney actually buy you? Not much,” Senator Dastyari said after visiting properties in Ryde, Toongabbie and Northmead.

Leanne and Bob Carabetta bought the Ryde property feat­ured in the video for $245,000 in 1999, as a young couple with a baby on the way.

The house had previously sold for $92,500 in July 1987, $108,000 in July 1995, and $187,000 in August­ 1996.

On Saturday, the three-bedroom­ home on Lane Cove Road, which had been listed for between $1.05m and $1.1m, sold for $1.3m at auction.

“This is what $1 million in Sydney will buy you,” Senator Dastyar­i said in a piece to camera in front of the home.

“This is what’s called a ‘classic house’ in the suburb of Ryde, immac­ulately kept as it’s been told, on one of the busiest roads of Sydney to boot.

“And you know if it’s got security shutters you’re onto a good thing.”

‘They love it here’: Col Gillies in Ryde, in northwest Sydney. Picture: Jane Dempster

Ms Carabetta, 46, said she had taken “great offence” at Senator Dastyari’s comment about the securit­y shutters, and “snobbery” about the house.

She said she had grown up in Blacktown, more than double Ryde’s distance from the CBD, and saw the inner-northwestern suburb as a nice place to live and raise a family.

“We had shutters because we didn’t have curtains and we had a baby,” she said.

Neighbour Col Gillies, who lives two doors down, said Senator Dastyari was wrong to sneer at his neighbourhood.

He admitted the proximity to busy, six-lane Lane Cove Road was a downside to the house where he and his wife have lived for 16 years, “but you get used to it”, he said. Ms Carabetta said she was surprised to find her house the subject of the video.

“What I wasn’t surprised about was a Labor political campaign that stated the obvious and didn’t say how they were going to fix it,” she said.

The Carabettas sold as a result of having separated, and Ms Carabetta said the sale was necessary to secure her financial future.

Mr Gillies said: “A lot of people in surrounding streets, they love it here.”

He said his home had recently been valued at $1.2m, but the value was largely academic ­because if the couple sold they would be forced to buy in the same expensive market.

“When the house (up the road) went for $1.3m I thought ‘you’ve got to be kidding’,” Mr Gillies said.

“It’s ridiculous but that’s the market.”

Senator Dastyari also visited a house being sold for $1m in Northmead, which was advertised as having a “functional kitchen”.

“For a f. king million dollars, you’d like to think that the kitchen would work,” he said in the video, which had been viewed almost 360,000 times late yesterday.

Senator Dastyari bought the house he shares with his wife and children in the inner-western ­Sydney suburb of Russell Lea for $1.36m in 2012.

The couple also own an investment property in Cammeray, on the lower north shore, where the average house price is $2.5m.

According to Senator Dasty­ari’s most recent entitlements claim, he spent almost $60,000 on “printing and communications”, including thousands of dollars on “web design and e-material”.

It’s not the first time Senator Dastyari has used the F-word in his social media videos.

In one video he is drinking a beer and comparing tax on alco­hol to the petroleum resource rent tax, labelling the PRRT a “f..king rort”, and in another, a caption asks “WTF is clean coal?”.

In a video about the government’s proposed changes to citizenship laws, he claims the government has been “f..king offensiv­e”, despite describing amendments which would have removed “insult and offend” from Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act as “Hate-teen C” in another video.

A video about 457 visa changes was titled “Vis-a-vis bullshit” and was accompanied by a digitally alter­ed image of Malcolm Turnbull in a dinner suit holding a platter­ ­of gold-plated faeces.

Sam Dastyari mocking the PM.

A recent video about Fairfax management features Senator Dastyari alongside his young daughters, equating job cuts at the company’s mastheads and chief executive Greg Hywood with My Little Pony toys and bowls of lollies­.

Sam Dastyari and his daughters in one video.

He previously made a similar video about banks, and has posted almost 50 videos this year alone. His most popular video, recorded after he invited One Nation leader Pauline Hanson to eat a halal snack pack with him on election night last year, has been viewed 2.1m times.

Senator Dastyari tweeted yesterday that he finds videos “an effectiv­e tool to get a message across”.

“Other MPs focus on printed material and flyers — each to their own,” he said.

He said some of his videos had been self-funded and self-prod­uced, while others were produced with funds from the communications allowance he receives as a senator.

Senator Dastyari said it was wrong to interpret his video as anything other than a “cry for reform­”.

“Borrowing $900,000 for a $1m first home locks people out,” he said.

Assistant Minister to the Treasurer Michael Sukkar said the “juvenile and embarrassing” video was yet another example of how out of touch the Labor Party was when it came to hard-working Australians and their aspiration for home ownership.

“Not everyone has generous Chinese benefactors or a union credit card like Mr Dastyari,” he said.

“The people he’s mocking have worked hard to own their own piece of Australia and are rightly proud of their homes.”