#184 Senator Andrew Bragg on fixing the Housing Crisis, Reforming Super & life inside Parliament

Senator Andrew Bragg is a Liberal Senator for New South Wales, first elected to the Senate in 2019. Throughout his time in Parliament, Andrew has been active in shaping policy across superannuation, technology, financial regulation, and housing. In March 2024, he was appointed Shadow Assistant Minister for Home Ownership.

In this episode, Andrew unpacks his journey into politics, his work in the Senate, and his focus on major reforms. We discuss his inquiry into superannuation governance, proposed reforms, the challenges facing first home buyers, lending policies, government support for infrastructure, and how political leadership can better address Australia's growing housing crisis.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
I'm Boris and this is straight talk Andrew Bragg? What
wild straight talk?

Speaker 2 (00:03):
Mate? Mark?

Speaker 1 (00:04):
How are you so you're the shadow Assistant Minister for
home Ownership in this country at a federal level and
you are the Liberal senator representing New South Wales in
the Federal Senate. That's right as a mouthful, but I'm
glad I got through the part.

Speaker 2 (00:17):
Sorry bout that.

Speaker 1 (00:18):
That's all right? And you live in Sydney, Yeah, yeah,
so but I noticed on my brief that you'll come
out of Shepard and Victoria originally.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
Yeah, what's the deal there?

Speaker 1 (00:27):
Like, what's it like living in Sydney not being able
to see your watch your AFL you have to watch
on television.

Speaker 2 (00:33):
I still go for Geelong because you never trust a
politician to changes footy teams.

Speaker 1 (00:37):
You're right, Do we know any who's done who've done that?
Plenty plenty? Albo never has. Oh he's always been a
house supporter. One good thing. No, that's not a good thing.
Unfortunately he's been a house supporter. But I would say unfortunately,
But so you love your footy still?

Speaker 2 (00:52):
I love Geelong?

Speaker 1 (00:53):
Yeah, do you have a Sydney team? You could be
a rooster mate. You could be with me and Nick
and all the other probably.

Speaker 2 (00:58):
Would be the roosters because Pad be in a Sydney.

Speaker 1 (01:00):
Yeah, well then you are. You are adopted. But straight away,
immediately you are eligible for adoption. I'm on the boards
and you just say, look, I'd like to apply for adoption,
and I can actually grant that sitting here right now.

Speaker 2 (01:12):
Well, I'm still going to show the greatest fidelity to Geelong,
to my greatest love.

Speaker 1 (01:16):
Yep, don't change your AFL. I'm not asking you to
come and go for Collingwood. I can't do that. I
know you can't do that. So how did you get
into politics? By the way, just take me through it.

Speaker 2 (01:26):
Well, So the connection back to Shepardon was that Dad
was in fruit growing and basically in the early nineties,
the big cannery in Sheperdon SPC. Shepardon Preserving Company was
closed down by the unions. Dad was involved in that.
I could see how big vested interests could damage a
whole town or a whole society, and so I was
very wary of collectivism. And so that's one of the

(01:48):
reasons why I joined.

Speaker 1 (01:49):
The Liberal Party.

Speaker 2 (01:50):
Philosophically, Yeah, philosophically, and I thought, you know, I really
love Australia. Dad was a migrant as well, so I
was always aware of that whole you know, trajectory had
changed of the whole family because they'd moved to Australia
for a better life. And so I felt some gratitude
towards Australia and I really wanted to make sure that
I could make a contribution.

Speaker 1 (02:11):
Was it? Then? What oranges? Is the name Bragg? Then well,
it's just English, like it's English pommes I six ten
pound pom wow?

Speaker 2 (02:18):
Right, and that show on standard the nament ten pound poms. Yep,
that is my family, is it for sure?

Speaker 1 (02:24):
Is the fama still love your famasilli? Yeah?

Speaker 2 (02:26):
Yeah, yeah. He came out when he was five or six,
in you know, the late forties.

Speaker 1 (02:31):
Yeah, I remember the period. I remember my friends of
mine who came out in the periods of older friends
who now passed away. And actually I was just thinking
about Shepard and she and there's a lot of fruit
down there, I remember.

Speaker 2 (02:40):
Yeah. I went to some uh Sin recall.

Speaker 1 (02:44):
Going some older plantations, but I went different. I definitely
sent lots of oranges.

Speaker 2 (02:48):
Pears, pears. I picked pears. That is hard work when
you clumb up the ladder and you fill your bag
full of pears, take it down the ladder, open up
the bag, and the pairs go into the palate. That's
once more step for that person, but a lot more
steps still to go until you fill that palet and
you get your forty bucks.

Speaker 1 (03:05):
Now, the Prime Minister who sat here not that long ago,
but he talked about his socially underprivileged sort of upbringing. Ye,
which is fair enough. But you seem to have come
from a sort of more like a business he sort
of background. It seems like you saw hard work, you know.
I mean people live in sheperd Is, particularly back when
you know you're a younger man. They're tough periods when

(03:27):
you're working, like you just said, picking pears, pick and fruit.
That's a pretty tough gig. It was.

Speaker 2 (03:32):
But I mean mum was a nurse, Dad was involved
in fruit. I wasn't sure what I wanted to do.
I spent a year working at Big w as a
night department manager. Yeah good, I love retail. I really
wanted to do that. But then ultimately Dad said, look,
you'd better to go to university. I think you could
do something else. So I went to Canberra. I went
to UNI.

Speaker 1 (03:49):
He went to Canberra. I went to a and or
to a new Aka. So Canberra is to somebody seeing
the mothership. There is a bit of a university, but
for different types of different types learnings and what do
you do at UNI?

Speaker 2 (04:03):
Well, I did accounting yep, and I did international relations.

Speaker 1 (04:06):
To like a commerce degree or any disagree or something
like that.

Speaker 2 (04:08):
I started my career at Ernst and Young, so right,
I was an internal order to there, so I understood
how risks could be managed or not managed by different
companies or numbers manipulated, that's right. I think one of
the ones I worked on with Babcock and Brown, so
that was a bit of an eye ap.

Speaker 1 (04:21):
Yeah, yeah, I remember those Babcock and Brown guys back
and there were talking about that was that period was
early two thousand, that's right. Yeah. And there was another
one called Orco as well, Babcock and Brown and Orco.
And I know that I knew that. I still know them.
One of us passed away now, but I knew the
principles behind both of those and they were like they
were the new Macquari banks. They were going to just

(04:43):
be the biggest businesses in the country, and of course
they both got in a bit of trouble ended up
being up winding down. So when did you get into
politics and why did you get in a poloices?

Speaker 2 (04:52):
I was selected in twenty nineteen yep, and I worked
in many financial services and I thought this is a
great opportunity for me to make a contribution. I ran
lost pre selection a few times, took a few hits,
but ultimately I was very keen to get there. So
now I'm at the end of my first term and
I'm running for reelection in twenty twenty five, and.

Speaker 1 (05:15):
I know that you actually went Worth my area for
at one stage weren't ye? I live in Wentworth here,
but did you ever apply to try to get pre
selected into the Wentworth area?

Speaker 2 (05:23):
I didnt think about that, but then I thought best
of it and I ended up running for the Senate
in twenty nineteen twenty NINETEENK. That was a good decision
because ultimately the Senate committees are where you can do
great policy work on super fintech, mortgage lending. A lot
of the detailed work, the grant work, it's done in
the Senate. If you know how to use the committees,
you can do really great public policy work.

Speaker 1 (05:45):
So maybe you could explain it to me a little bit,
a little bit deeper, because we all are quite familiar
with our local repor might be in the Lower House,
the House Representatives where bills or legislation starts, but not
many of us really have had a bunch of ex
exposure to senators what they call the upper House, where
what gets past the lower House has to go through

(06:07):
You have to get through the upper House as well,
if I'm presuming using the right terms. But the upper
House is not really controlled by the liberal labor then
there are a lot of independence there, like like Pocock
for example, And there are and you know, you know,
first Nature one Nation of Jackie Lamby and independence and Pauline,

(06:29):
et cetera. They're in the Senate. It's a fun place
to be sometimes and it's a it's a hard place
to control. When I say control, there's no one has
control over it, and anything can happen. Deals get done.
It looks like to me, deals get done the left
front center. So we will vote with you or your
party on this bill on the basis that you will

(06:55):
help us along on this thing we're trying to get
through is.

Speaker 2 (06:57):
That is that? Would that be about right of transactional?
Very transactional And a lot of the work I've done
in this Parliament investigating the crime to the super funds,
looking at ask the corporate cop why it's been so
hopeless mortgage lending rules. This was only possible because I
had an ability to talk to the Greens, and the
Greens wouldn't necessarily agree with my findings, but they would

(07:21):
agree that it was worthy of having a process. Whereas
the government, the Labor Party would never support anything I
was wanting to inquire into it because they were worried
I might dammage one of their favorite things, like the
super funds or the unions. So okay, so how does
that start?

Speaker 1 (07:35):
Andrew Lake? So let's say you decide, well, you think
a good thing to be looked at virus Senate's inquiry
called let's let's talk about unions for argument, say well,
super let's have a look, good, hard look at super
What do you do? You walk along to the green?

Speaker 2 (07:56):
How does it all worked?

Speaker 1 (07:57):
You yell on to your to the leader of your party.
How does it work? It's a great question.

Speaker 2 (08:00):
So right now is a fund called SeaBus which is
chaired by Wayne Twine, who is also the president of
the Labor.

Speaker 1 (08:06):
Party and the ex Treasurer of the country.

Speaker 2 (08:08):
That's right, and the act the corporate cop I said
that they haven't paid ten thousand death claims for their
members who die ten thousand.

Speaker 1 (08:17):
It's a lot of families, right, Wow, So you should
just explain that and with that, because super funds have
a default. If I've got my money with if I'm
working on a SeaBus, so that's construction. Let's say I'm
working on a on a building side and whatever, I'm
a rigger and I get paid more wages by the
company I work for, my super goes direct to SeaBus.

(08:40):
That's right, manages my super. One of the things that
normally happens in these circumstances is that the super fund
that I have got my money invested in through my employer,
generally speaking, has a default disability and death or like
a toaller insurance in there which my contributions will pay

(09:01):
for me over time. And then if I something unfortunately
happens to me on the site in this example, then
I will make the claim against my insurance, with which
seabuses sort of like some be managing for me.

Speaker 2 (09:12):
That's right?

Speaker 1 (09:12):
Is that right?

Speaker 2 (09:13):
That's right? So ten thousand times the AC the corporate
coppers here, they haven't paid those death claims and so
they've done some horrible things to some of these families,
including asking them to have two death certificates, right, as
if one wasn't enough, And so what's crazy?

Speaker 1 (09:29):
Only do I want?

Speaker 2 (09:30):
These people are so mean and I think they're so
privileged because they're so used to the money just falling in, right,
they open the door, the money falls in. That's how
the super funds feel, and so they're very privileged. They
don't care about people. And so this is an example
where I would say to the Greens, look, this is
really bad. Okay, a lot of people are hurting. I
think we should have an inquiry into this, get to

(09:51):
the bottom of it, make some recommendations.

Speaker 1 (09:53):
So you got along too, Do you got along Shoebridge band?

Speaker 2 (09:55):
Do you go along to Nick McKim, Nick McKim, Yah Tasmania.

Speaker 1 (09:59):
Ye?

Speaker 2 (09:59):
Talk to him and usually he's able to get agreement
on process. If I went to Labor and said, look,
ten thousand people have been wronged by sea Bus, then
say we don't care. We're not going to have an
inquiry to that.

Speaker 1 (10:11):
That doesn't make sense because the workers are their people.

Speaker 2 (10:14):
Yeah, but the problem is that all their retired politicians
like Wayne Swan and co. Are on the board of
these funds, and in the case of mister Swan, he's
also the president of their party. Of the party, they're
very conflicted. So they're not going to have an inquiry
to that, are.

Speaker 1 (10:28):
They makes sense it? Well, I guess they're not going
to throw their own blow under the bus, that's right.
So you go along to mckinn and you say to him, look,
this is what i've evidence. I've got. Let's set up
an inquiry.

Speaker 2 (10:39):
And then we put a motion into the Senate Chamber
saying we're going to have an inquiry into the non
payment of death claims, the governance of the funds, conflicts
of interest, blah blah blah, and then the Senate will
say yes or no, and if the Liberals and the
Greens agree, then it's done. And then you've got your
inquiry and then they can have call for submissions. You

(11:00):
get use the hundreds of submissions from consumer groups, real people,
the regulators, and then you have public hearings. You get
people in and you asked them the tough questions. So
one thing we did last year was we actually called
Wayne Swan to come into the hearing. Interesting what happened, Well,
firstly he said no, we're not going to come.

Speaker 1 (11:17):
Are they obliged?

Speaker 2 (11:18):
Well, we got advice from the Clerk of the Senate.
This is very dorky, and the Clerk of the Senate said,
well he must attend. So we summoned him legally and
then he turned up and we asked him questions for
a couple of hours.

Speaker 1 (11:32):
And what's your role in this inquiry? Are you one chair?
You're the chair? And who else has made up? Is
like ten people on the committee? Is soundly one of
those things you see in these American movies where they're
doing an inquiry into a mafia and he got the
mafia boss sitting there and they got all these politicians
standing up there and saying could you tell us about this?
Like the JFK sort of JK dot, those sort of inquiries.

Speaker 2 (11:55):
I think exactly what it is mark that committee system
that we have we style from America.

Speaker 1 (11:59):
Right.

Speaker 2 (11:59):
It's another example where Australia takes the best the world
has to offer and makes it our own. In our
own own Australian ways, so the.

Speaker 1 (12:05):
World's best practice.

Speaker 2 (12:06):
Yeah, it's good.

Speaker 1 (12:07):
And so in that inquiry, just for example, at these
ten thousand claims that weren't paid, processed and were paid,
and what did you find?

Speaker 2 (12:20):
We found we found a page to Yeah, we did
a report. We recommended reforms and in talking to some
of these people, some people were about to die, some
people had died and they were their families weren't paid.
Some people were strung out for years and years. So
we found that there was a negligence and that the
law needed to be tighter on these funds so they

(12:40):
couldn't just string these people along. So we made those recommendations.
We also recommended that the superfund boards have more competent
people on them because, as you know, Mark, the fish
rots in the head. So you know, if you have
a board full of gold mates in the unions who've
got no experience or no knowledge of risk management, governance,
how to treat people, then you're going to have problems.

(13:02):
And that's what we've got right now in super.

Speaker 1 (13:04):
Is there in terms of these industry funds because you're
talking about industry funds now, yeah, is that prevalent in
other words, is it the majority of times that the
super funds have got this so called old mates system
going on. In other words, they've got labor guys and
the union guys sort of sitting within the fund somehow
have been a gatekeeper or whatever you want to call

(13:25):
it in relation to what that fund does and or
doesn't do.

Speaker 2 (13:28):
It is systemic. You've got It's not as Wayne Swan's
Nicola ucktion. It's James Molino, who is a deputy Premier
of Victoria. They're all on these boards and I think
this is causing a major problem where the funds aren't
acting in the interests of the workers. They're often acting
in interests of the unions and the labor party. Do
they get paid for these jobs? They get paid, and
often the money goes through to the union. So in

(13:50):
the case of the SeaBus Fund, it's giving millions of
dollars every year to the CFMAU. And today as it stands, CFMU,
which is in administration, owns twenty percent of sea Bus.
So a union in administration is allowed to own a
major financial corporation, which is compulsory. Compulsory, I mean you

(14:12):
have to have soup. I just think this is a
sector which needs the best governance, not the worst governance.

Speaker 1 (14:18):
Wow. That's and does any of that money find his
way back into the Labor Party, Of course, of course
it does.

Speaker 2 (14:25):
They get millions of dollars through that channel, through the
director's fees and other sponsorship payments. And in fact, there
was a review recently which found that a lot of
the payments for services were services that were never actually
given and che just a way to transfer cash through
in a very corrupt way. So of course it helps labor.
That's why Labor's defended this system forever and ever. But

(14:45):
we will point out the deficiencies because we think that
the people will deserve better than this.

Speaker 1 (14:50):
So and this was originally set up by Paul Keenny,
of course in the hidden set the industry funds, but
he originally set up the compulsory subminiration back in the
early nineties. And I actually I think it was one
of the best a piece of legislation. I actually think
it's a good thing from Australia from an economics point
of view, that it's not on the government's perse when
people retiring, you have to pay support people like they
have to do another place in the world. But as

(15:11):
these things get bigger and more delicious and more deeper, deeper,
deep in terms of the amount of money that they've
got into them and Australia. In Australia, our super funds,
I think now of our pace the banks in terms
of investable assets they've gone. They're bigger than our banking system.
Do you see are we facing a sort of a

(15:34):
risk in Australia, like a a multi pronged risk through
the super funds. And I'm not taking any away from
the need for super innovation. I think it's a great thing.
I really do, compository supernovation. It's something I really believe in.
But at the same time, who's sort of sitting on
top of this money, who's managing this money, and how

(15:54):
this money is managed. It's got to get to find
its way back to the person to put the money
in the first place, especially in terms of death or
in injury, but also just it's got to be run properly.
It's got to be managed properly. It should be subject
to all the normal things that corporations are subject to.
Is there an organization that overseas and says, well, just
like acid overseas companies we're going to oversee you and

(16:14):
we don't like the fact that you've got these sort
of directors there. We want you to change the independence
of these directors. Has anyone overseeing this stuff?

Speaker 2 (16:23):
Well, there's a couple of points. Firstly, the idea, whilst
might be laudable, hasn't been very successful. Most Australians are
still on the pension and will be by the middle
of this century, so it super makes very little difference
to pension reliance over the long term. Wow, there are
more part pensioners, it compete to full pensioners, but overall
it hasn't been very successful in getting people off the pension. Secondly,

(16:46):
in terms of the governance, it's got the same governance
model it had when Paul Keating established it. That's for
political reasons. The Senate has on multiple occasions defeated legislation
which would have made sure that the funds had independent directors,
had better conflict of interest policies, so.

Speaker 1 (17:03):
They stopped that from happening. Dastiari stopped it.

Speaker 2 (17:06):
SAMII stopped remember Samo was a former senator.

Speaker 1 (17:09):
He stopped it.

Speaker 2 (17:10):
He had other issues which you know about. But ultimately
labor have not been prepared to support improvements to the
governance of this scheme. So I think it has problems
for people who love SUPER. I say to them, why
don't you make the governance better? That way it's more
sustainable for you.

Speaker 1 (17:25):
Okay, well, let's I'm a skeptic, right, you're up for
re election, then your party's up for election, and your
your fearless leader Peter Dunton, who sat in that very chair.
What are you guys going to what's coming out in
to the policy relation to Super? What are you thinking about,
like what changes you guys are going to put on
your platform.

Speaker 2 (17:43):
We're not going to have a three million dollar tax
on Super, so.

Speaker 1 (17:47):
What you mean is you're not going to have tax
on assets over three million dollars. That's right, So that's
an important point. Can we just talk about that for
a second, so maybe you can explain what that is.
By the way, most people don't even get it. I
know you guys think everybody understan as were talking about,
but the average Australian doesn't happen three million dollars with
assets in the Super and they never think that one
day they will have three million dollars with asset. This

(18:08):
just goes off the top of their head. So maybe
you and I'll be honest, I got friends of mine
who don't even know that the tax on super innovation
in your super fund is less than the normal tax.
People just don't understand how the super thing works. I mean,
in most of all, the young guys over of these
guys over he who I pay their super they probably
don't even think like it. They don't even think of
as an asset because it's they can't touch it. They don't.

(18:32):
They just assume it's been well looked after. I've never
had a question from them. I don't even know where.
I couldn't tell, and I own the business. I couldn't
see whether this money gets put and maybe they've elected
to put it somewhere else. Maybe you can explain this
three million dollar asset level after which you start to
pay much more tax on your super.

Speaker 2 (18:50):
Yeah, so the government, the labor government, have a proposal
to charge you a higher tax rate if you have
more than three million dollars in assets in your fund
that hasn't gone through.

Speaker 1 (18:58):
The hasn't gone through.

Speaker 2 (19:00):
Right, and it's based on unrealized gains. So whether you
sell the asset or not, you still pay the tax,
So it's a tax on a balance.

Speaker 1 (19:06):
So you're a got a super fund. You cleverly gone
by in your suit fund something worth a million bucks
and then miraculously there's a rezoning in Victoria and it
now becomes worth five million. But you haven't realized you're
still own this bit of land for example. That's right,
it could be a liquid. Yeah, it could be anything.
Let's say it is a liquid. Well, let's say you
just want to hold it. You don't want to sell it.

(19:28):
You got to pay tax on it's now worth five minutes.
You've got to pay You've got to pay a tax
on that.

Speaker 2 (19:33):
Even though you haven't got the cash. You're going to
find a way to pay the you got to sell it. Correct,
So that's an ugly scheme. We don't like that idea.
And then more broadly, we think that the system should
be better governed. We have in the past proposed there
be independent directors on the boards and that there be
more competition in the system overall. So like we think

(19:54):
that if you're going to have super let's make sure
that it's feed income and working for the people. Our
main pole though, is that people can use their own
Super to get a first house deposit.

Speaker 1 (20:05):
So explain that fifty So if you.

Speaker 2 (20:07):
Have some money in Super, you can take up to
fifty thousand bucks to buy your first house.

Speaker 1 (20:13):
To go towards the deposit.

Speaker 2 (20:14):
Yeah, yep. So I'll give you an example. So the
average thirty eight year old has ninety grand in the
Super right. So a lot of people by their first
house when they are partnered with a husband or a
wife or partner. So two people coming together in their
late thirties could get one hundred grand to support their
first home deposit now out of the Super, out of

(20:36):
the super, cash out of the Super now, even in
Sydney where the market is ridiculous, that would make a
material difference to your deposit totally.

Speaker 1 (20:44):
And if you've already saved some money as well, the
say've already saved between one hundred grand, you got two
hundred grand. That's twenty percent of a million dollar property.

Speaker 2 (20:51):
That's right. And the reason that we are so high
conviction on this policy is because we believe that the
key test of your retirement success is your housing stifle us.
It's not your superhannovation balance, it's your housing status that
drives your success in retirement.

Speaker 1 (21:06):
That's just very interesting because you know, one thing that's
really important is when someone retires, they want to retire
with security, not just securitive income, but security of real estate.
Where you've got a roof, have you, you don't have
to retire so that house. Yeah, totally, it's very important.
So if they sell the house, which inevitably everyone Australia
does every four, four or five years, Let's say they

(21:28):
sell the house and they bought the house an example
you just we just talked about it. It's a million
bucks and they sell for three million dollars and it's
tax free because that's the principal place of residence. Do
you have to put the fifty grand back?

Speaker 2 (21:40):
They've got to put it back, and they've got to
put a portion of the of the return.

Speaker 1 (21:43):
Back in a proportion of the profit they made. Yeah,
so which makes sense because they've just made two million
dollars on that example, they've got to put the fifty back.
Both we've got to put fifty back eage and they've
got to put a percentage of the profit back as
well into the super fund.

Speaker 2 (21:57):
Correct. But the principle is that if you don't own
a house, this policy is about it making sure you
can own one house. It's not a one house for
your whole life. It's if you don't own a house today,
you can use your super to.

Speaker 1 (22:07):
Get into the market. That's right. But can you if
you do sell it, can you go back in get
another fifty hour a year, supert you can just continually
do it to help top you up? Why not? Yeah? No, no, totally.
So I like that as a good policy. No one's
talking about it. How come we are talking about it now?
You are, But I mean I haven't seen the media
talk about it.

Speaker 2 (22:25):
Well. I think it's going to be one of the
most contested parts of the election because the Labor government
don't like the idea. They want all the money to
be locked up in super and in fact they want
the super funds to invest in Australian residential property but
ban people from doing the same thing. So I think
it's crazy.

Speaker 1 (22:40):
They want the big super funds, they love that to
go and buy austrain residential property.

Speaker 2 (22:45):
They love the idea of you know, branded out to us, yeah,
black Rock, Vanguard, Cebus whatever. They like the idea of
those big funds, institutional funds owning Australian properties and then
renting them out to Australians. Now, we think that's sort
of a sick, a sick Australian dream. Our Australian dream
is for individuals because we've been a property owning democracy
since the Second World War, right in the main where

(23:07):
most Australians have owned a house on an average income,
and now that's slipping away as the house becomes further
and further multiple of your salary. And so this is
one of the best ways to get the Australian dream
back on track if you haven't got access to the
bank of mom and dad.

Speaker 1 (23:22):
Yeah, and well, one of the things I want to
talk about and on the bank of my dad, because
I mean I asked this question. I've done quite a
few podcasts this morning. I've had the great Chris Joy
on today and good Chris and I were talking about
a whole series of topics and largely about the economy,
et cetera. But we didn't get political. But one of
the things I did say to him is I said

(23:43):
to him, and it's a pet hate of mine, is that,
as you know, I'm in the lending game. We all
broke for the banks, but we also lend our own product,
and like everybody, we have dead tohere to the rules
as to how you assess a borrower, and right now,
as it has been since around twenty twenty early twenty twenty,

(24:09):
when the pandemic first hit, the threshold that we had
to apply to borrowers was three percent. In other words,
if the current interest rate is let's call it seven percent,
let's call it six percent for a home loan from

(24:30):
many of the banks or US. If I'm trying to
work out how much you can afford to borrow both
on your repayments, which will then inform me how much
I can lend you as well, I have to not
assess you with six percent. I have to assess you
at nine percent. I have to ad three percent. If
I don't do that, I don't have to do that.
But if I don't do that, then I get punished

(24:53):
on the other side when I go to get the
money from the capital markets that I need to lend
to you. We don't have a deposit taking license like
the banks to have. I have to pay more because
you know, the various investment people are going to say,
well that that loan doesn't follow the current rules. Therefore,

(25:14):
it's a bit more risky. What I don't like about
that rule in this environment. I get it when interest
rates are point one of a percent, Sure, I get
it because you know, like INTERUS rates are only going
to go one way, it's up, when in the fact,
it would be negligent not to add three percent at
that point because they're going to go up. But when
interust rates at an all time high, it sounds elitist

(25:37):
to me to apply that rule against someone who's just
trying to buy their first home for argument's sake. And
all it means is I'm going to I'm going to
assess them out of the market. Lenders are going to
assess them out of market. In other words, they can
never afford to borrow as much as someone who's more
more wealthy, and the more what that means, the more
wealthy person will outbid them every time because they can

(25:58):
afford to pay more. And all we're doing is creating
a chasm between the haves and have nots. It's not
really a liberal police more traditionally more a labor policy,
the haves and have nots type thing. What do you
guys got, you've got a view on this.

Speaker 2 (26:13):
So the buffer the three percent buffer you talk about
mark is ridiculous for first time buyers. So if we
win the election, we'll change the rules so that first
home buyers can have a lower buffer, maybe two percent
rather than three percent, so they can borrow more. But
also we want to change the way that lenders mortgage
and insurance is priced into a mortgage because.

Speaker 1 (26:35):
Generally speeding that borrower is borrowing more than eighty percent.

Speaker 2 (26:38):
That's right and correct, So we also want to make
sure that that gets a lower price when it's considered
by the regulator and by the bank, so that first
home buyers. So we want to make sure that first
time buyers can have their scales tilted in their favor
against investors. So by changing the buffer and by changing

(26:59):
the LMI cap treatment, we think this is a good way.
So for example, someone with a half a million dollar
loone could borrow an extra forty thousand dollars and they
would also save about twenty basis points on their line,
which be about a thousand bucks a year. That's a
genuine benefit to a first home owner perspective that wouldn't
be available to an investor. So when I did this

(27:21):
inquiry last year, the inquiry. We looked into the detail
of this and I went and met with all these
fantastic dogs and academics who look at the ins and
outs of housing polsy trific like brains. And one thing
that one thing that I really liked was that we're

(27:42):
one of the only countries in the OECD that doesn't
use lending polsy to help first own buyers. One of
the only countries that doesn't do this. If you look
at almost every other OECD country, they have some sort
of bias in their laws, their lending laws to help
for home bias.

Speaker 1 (28:01):
It's sort of proper policy. Yeah, it's economic policy. You'd
like to help our people who aren't as well off,
so why wouldn't we have that well, And because Australia
is also one of the few countries in the world
has a disproportionate percentage of investors relative to unoccupies. Too,
we have a huge number of first of investors in

(28:22):
all the pools and mortgages. And the reason I know
that is because I often go on road shows to
raise money you know, for bond bond is shoes against
mortgage pools, and we're always getting asked by the people
as to the percentage of investor loans in the portfolio
relative to the owner occupieres. It's not the same another
place like the US, for example, you don't get that

(28:44):
sort of level of investor And maybe it's maybe it
has something to do with the fact that in these
other environments and these other areas, that there is a
bias towards an owner occupier. And by the way, there
should be a bias towards and I mean it makes sense.
Why should I be preferred as an investor against one
of the boys in the room here who are trying

(29:05):
to buy a property. And if we're trying to buy
it in Smithfield and Sydney, if I got if I
can borrow more money than them, and my interest rate
is less because I don't have any mortgage insurance to pay,
it's all in my favor. I can afford to pay
more correct, which means I allow bid them every time correct.

Speaker 2 (29:20):
So it makes sense for us to do this because
we want to be a property owning democracy. And now,
if you look at the trajectory that millennials and gen
Z's are on, most of them are on a tradutary
never to own a house. So that's why the lending staff.
The superstuff is really important. But we also wanted to
find a way that wasn't going to result in distortions,
because even though you say there's lots of investors, we

(29:41):
want investors in the market to be providing supply in stock. So,
you know, the Greens say, well, we can solve the
nation's housing crisis by fiddling around with CGT negative gearing.
I mean, I wish, I wish it was that simple.
I mean, if only it was that simple. So the
changes to lending and to super don't down mean to
do anyone else. They only help the individual prospective first time.

Speaker 1 (30:04):
Buyer, So Andrew tell me, maybe get exposed to me. Then,
as we know, Chris Bowen helped Bill Shorten lose that
election in favor of Scott Morrison by promoting the deletion

(30:26):
or the exclusion of negative gearing and the couple of
gains the benefits of owning investment property and only have
to pay the discount rate of tax if you made
a profit. And apart from it, he also tried to
introduce frank getting rid of franking credits too, so which
is extraordinary unpopular popular when so labor is not likely

(30:46):
to make that mistake again. I mean they're politically, they're
pretty they know what's going on. They're pretty good politically
as politicians. They read the market and they do their
polling and they know what's popular and what's not popular.
What do you think would happen if the Greens came
along to you in the center say Mae, listen Andrew, mate,
we've helped you out on this inquiry, that inquiry, we

(31:08):
need you to help us out on you know, needative gearing.

Speaker 2 (31:12):
What do you do?

Speaker 1 (31:13):
What do you say to that's my no go zone,
that's not negotiable? How does that work?

Speaker 2 (31:17):
We had an inquiry into it and found that if
you change negative gearing and CGT, it would have a
minuscule change on price in terms of making affordability easier.
But what it will do is shocked the supply side
of the market, so you have few houses built. So
we're not afraid of having the debate about that. We've

(31:38):
had the debate for a long time. We're in favor
of lower taxes and more houses, not higher taxes and
fewer houses. So like it will never be part of
our platform in the way that Chris Balen wanted it
to be part of Labour's policy some almost ten years
ago now.

Speaker 1 (31:54):
And do you think that's that policy is secretly bubbling
below the service in the labor parties still.

Speaker 2 (32:02):
A look, I couldn't say for certain, But as you know,
the only way to solve the housing crisis is to
build more houses. Really, I mean, it's mainly supply side factor,
and I think the bigger risk for politicians is that
they sided with the nimbi's and I understand that internally,
you know, inside the Liberal Party there's probably a lot
of people that would like to see fewer houses built

(32:23):
because they want to earn ouse potentially right, But we've
got to be governing for millennials gen Z's younger people,
because every apartment building that gets knocked over today by
a NIMBI makes it harder and harder for a younger
person to get that entry level flat. And as you know,
it's a highly urbanized population Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, that's where
a lot of people will get their first house. So

(32:45):
I think that's the biggest risk that you play footage
with a nimbi's.

Speaker 1 (32:49):
So why don't we just talk about a nimbi's that's
not in my backyard people. They're people who say, I
support everything you want to do, but just as long
at it's next door to me, and there's next door
to someone. Everything's next door to someone at the end
of the day. That's the truth. And the nimbi's have
some influence in relation to local councils and they get
the lot of influence. And then because they tend to
get the local ward counselor whoever the council is for

(33:12):
the local ward, they built up action groups and that
sort of stuff. And so let me just ask you
then about the supply side for housing. So you're right.
The only way you really solve anyway you really solve
housing issue in Australia for the population that we have,

(33:33):
in other words, having enough supply of housing for it
to be more affordable for everybody. Apart from looking at
the lending policies and l A min and all that
sort of stuff. With great initiatives, you have to build
more houses. And in Albanyes he did announce he governed
announced one point two million. I think it was a
new houses over five y period. But they're way behind.
I noticed that they don't talk about it much anymore.

(33:55):
I remember I was at the AFI Property Summit. I
was one of the people they asked to come along
and speak think about it, and I spoke about with Shane.
Shane Oliver and I did it together. And then I
noticed there a number of developers there and the only
ones who at the end of the day who supply
housing is not the government. It's not the AFR, it's

(34:15):
not mere a lender. It's the developers. You've got to
get them to feel encouraged to release the land that
they've got to either put houses or apartments on there.
Because government doesn't build houses. I mean they can, but
they're not doing it, and it has developers. And the
developers build housing on the basis of lenders giving them

(34:38):
the money to do the development and also being able
to control the costs. In other words, it's a viable project.
Developers can't get enough money or can't get the money
from the lenders, which is usually the banks, unless the
banks and or in some cases private lenders private money

(34:58):
is confident that the these guys can get enough pre
sales pre sales that are going to count, so that
the lender doesn't feel exposed. In other words, generally speaking,
they like enough pre sales to cover the total borrowing costs,
so that they know that if push comes to shove
and if you can build it for that price, the

(35:19):
amount of money we're going to lend you, we're always
going to get paid back. As we can see on
a piece of paper on a spreadsheet that you have
sold one hundred apartments out of the two hundred properties
that houses or units in our building. So they're sort
of de risking themselves. But those pre sales don't count
unless borrowers buyers, i should say, feel confident that they

(35:43):
can borrow the dough so it goes back to the lenders,
So it actually goes back to the consumer. Right at
the end of the day. Can I feel like I
can borrow this amount of money and can I afford it?
Especially in this high interest rate environment? What would you say,
Let's assume for a moment, you guys just don't crack

(36:04):
it and Charmers is back there at the helmet now
the treasurer again, what would you What question would you
be asking Jim Chalmers? Mate, what policy? What question around policy?
You're going to be saying to Jim Chalmers, he's going
to do to help these people? And help these developers
sell these buildings and help the lenders lend them money
to the developer so they can construct the building and
help the buyers buy these apartments enough to satisfy the lenders.

Speaker 2 (36:29):
Well, there's two questions. Firstly, I'd ask him for an
attitude readjustment, and that does he understand that the government
on its own can never actually solve the housing problem,
that the people you need to build the houses, trades people,
builders and developers. That's the first question. I think the
answer to that is uncertain from his point of view. Secondly,

(36:52):
I would ask him, is he going to ask the
Australian banks, who are protected with the Four Pillars policy
a deposit guarantee? Is he going to ask the Australian
banks to support Australian housing and the Australian dream. Is
he going to ask the banks to provide provide finance
to developers because as you know, most developers now are

(37:13):
relying on non bank finding product main which is costing more.
It's ridiculous and it's all going into the input cost
of the housing development. And if I've got a third question,
I would say to him, what will the government do
to help cut the cost of building and help make
it a more viable product, because when I walk around
a building site, the developer is paying for the street lights,

(37:36):
the nature stripped, the footpath, the sewerage, the roads, and
then that's all being subsumed into the cost of the
product and being passed on.

Speaker 1 (37:44):
And also continue to parklands the whole of other stuff.

Speaker 2 (37:47):
But no wonder, the minimum viable product for an apartment
is unviable and uneconomic in so many cases. So those
are the three questions I'd ask the good doctor Charmers.

Speaker 1 (38:00):
And why do you think they don't address these things?
Because why, I don't know. I just can't believe Andrew
that they don't know this. I know.

Speaker 2 (38:07):
I think the answer to that is very clear. They
take all their advice from the Union and they love
the idea of a sort of public service approach to this,
which is why they put all their faith in this
Housing Australia Future Fund. And they have a view that
the government itself can build a lot of houses, which
is kind of crazy, you know, Soviet Union's socialist style

(38:27):
polsy thinking. But I don't think there's any thought in
their minds as to how they can help builders and
developers cut the cost of building and therefore the viability
of the enterprise.

Speaker 1 (38:41):
But equally, even if the government builds these properties, they're
going to have the same issues that developers gone anyway.
It's just going to and the government's going to have
to try and control the costs. Of course, and governments
cannot control costs. I mean, developer has got a better
chance of controlling the cost per unit being built than
a government has because and the government's going to have

(39:01):
to pick up the same cost. And it sounds like
to me a way of going broke.

Speaker 2 (39:04):
Well, if you if you have, if you have the
government property developer, the first person you guarantee to have
on the building side is to see if m MEU
at least when triggered baff builds, he's found a way
to keep these people at bay.

Speaker 1 (39:18):
Well, but that's a really good point. So if the
government's building it, the next thing, you know, we're going
to have the trade unions on the side. It's going
to become a trade union side, and the traders are
going to say, well, they're they're a my pals. I'm
just going to put the will just change the pricing
and you know, all the trades are going to have
to going to cost more, and we're going to you
and you'll be paying. Instead of working five days, we
can work three days with whatever. I mean, I'm just

(39:38):
suspecting this is what's going to happen. How is that
a good idea that the government starts to build these things?
I mean, why do why do we try to put
this into the government coffers and not leave it at
the at private level.

Speaker 2 (39:48):
Well, it's not a good idea, which is why we
if we win the election, will abolish the Housing Australia
Future Fund and we'll be supporting private developers and builders
through our Supply Fund, which will pay for a last
mile infrastructure, so it will pay for those roads, sewerage connections,
street lights, whatever. We think that's a better way of
getting the cost down. And also we're going to freeze

(40:10):
the Construction Code for ten.

Speaker 1 (40:12):
Years because which means what we see, there's.

Speaker 2 (40:15):
A national Construction Code and every time it's changed by Canberra,
it costs more and more money to build.

Speaker 1 (40:21):
But what does the code tell them to do? Well?

Speaker 2 (40:23):
It creates the minimum standards for building a house in
Australia and it's more and more complex every year, and
so we're saying ten years, no more changes to that
because every time they change it, it costs more money. So
we've got to get the cost of building down. That's
very important. I know it's some very sexy political argument,

(40:44):
but that's we're up to now in Australia. We've got
to get the cost of building down. Obviously we had
more builders coming into the country, would have been helpful,
but the government's trades The government's had more yoga teachers
and they've had builders coming now. I love good yoga
teacher because Harris call back. It's very helpful. But no
expursion's been cast there. But right now, you know, we

(41:06):
need more trades people.

Speaker 1 (41:07):
Yeah, one percent, and particularly in places like I'm just
thinking of myself, but up in northern New South Wales
and those sorts of areas which are still suffering from
the floods in terms of getting back on side, Like
I've been trying to a bit of building up there.
Oh my god, Like you're what a tradesman was costing,
say four years on a tweed. Yeah, yeah, four years ago.

(41:29):
Like let's say, electrician was eighty bucks and now they're
like one hundred and sixty bucks. Now if you can
get one and all of a sudden makes most things
not viable. And that's across all trades. And I'm not
blaming the trades people because they can do that because
they're in demand. And if I'm in trades and anything
I'm doing, if I'm in demand, I take the opportunity
to charge more if I can, if I'll charge what
the market will bear for as long as it will

(41:50):
bear it. And I don't blame these guys from and
girls from getting more money. I don't. That's not the point.
But the point is in a system sense, we have
to make it affordable really so people can survive, and
that means we get we need more competition, we need
just more people here prepared to do the work that's right.
Is there an issue about getting those people? They can?
Those people not available from means.

Speaker 2 (42:10):
The labor government didn't want any of these workers to
come in the country because they wouldn't join the CFMU, right,
and so the CFMU have had a lot of power
over this government. One of the first things this government
did was they abolished the Building Construction Commission, which was
like the cop on the beat for the building sector.
So we think basically having a big supply fund, stopping

(42:32):
their costs out of control. Stuff with the construction code,
bringing in new new builders and construction workers, and then
the stuff on lending and super We think that's going
to move the needle on housing straight away.

Speaker 1 (42:48):
So you know, we saw and I'm not suggesting you
guys are going to be Trump like, but no, we
want But Trump said, look in the first hundred days,
I'm going to do this. Next hundred days. I mean,
you guys prepare to commit to those sort of things,
you know, the first term, the first six months of
our first elected term.

Speaker 2 (43:06):
We'll have to because if we don't make you talk otherwise,
if you don't make material ground on supply, then the
problem becomes our problem. So Laboy said they'd build one
point two million houses. They're only on track to build
about seven hundred thousand houses. We need to be building
about two hundred and fifty thousand houses a year in Australia, right,
So just put it into sort of context. Under the

(43:29):
last College and government, we got one hundred and ninety
five thousand houses a year on average. Under this governments
down to one hundred and seventy thousand. Got to get
up to two fifty thousand. So if within twelve months
we haven't moved a needle on that, then we are
in a lot of trouble. So I don't like a
lot of the Trump policies. I don't like a lot

(43:50):
of the methods. But I do like the fact that
he was organized and ready to go. So because you
haven't got a minute to wait.

Speaker 1 (43:56):
Because I was going to say, well, what does that
mean in organizing? A ready goes like? Obviously he had
Musk there and all those of people ready to jump
on everything. How do you guys? Sort of Otherwise, everything's
just a good idea. It's all about the execution. As
you know, it's not about the idea. Good idea is important,
but you've got to be able to execute on a
good idea. You've got some good ideas you talk about today,
How do I give you an example?

Speaker 2 (44:17):
Give you an example. So I would say to counsels
and developers that I meet with, please do not wait
to do the feasibility report for what you need funded,
whether it's a new series system or a new road
to support this development. Please do the work now. If
we win the election, you can send it in on
the first day or the second day. You've got to
get work done now so that if you win, you're

(44:40):
ready to go. You're ready to legislate your new policy, right,
You're ready to ss the funding grants those sorts of things.

Speaker 1 (44:48):
So let's say for it, because I mean, I've been
listening to listen to the radio here in the mornings
of the last period, and we've been talking about the
Electrical Trades Union here holding things up, and the people
in the ward, you know, the water board, waterboards a disaster,
you know, not approving this or not doing that, and
their public servants, I mean, someone inside is deciding at

(45:08):
what speed they go their state, your federal Sure, can
you go in there and sort of telling hey, guys,
just get this thing sorted.

Speaker 2 (45:17):
Well, if you prepare to use your pulpit. Yes, I mean,
but politics is about advocacy.

Speaker 1 (45:21):
Now.

Speaker 2 (45:21):
Chris Means, who has said a lot of good things
about housing, and I think he's done a lot of.

Speaker 1 (45:26):
Frankly, he's done a lot of good things.

Speaker 2 (45:29):
Actually, Chris Means want to be the housing premiere, but
his agencies like the water Board are destroying it. So
if we were the government and we were going to
fund a piece of water infrastructure. Then we would use
our pulpit to point that out to him and hopefully
embarrass him into doing what needs to be done. So
you've got to be able to advocate and use your position.
What does that mean pulpit or pull pull pit? You

(45:51):
know you're like in church.

Speaker 1 (45:53):
I mean yeah, yeah, as in the church.

Speaker 2 (45:55):
You've got to stand up and you've got to advocate.

Speaker 1 (45:58):
That's the job, and that is that you're if you
stay in this role, that's your role. So you would
you be like, I can't. I'm just trying to work
out how it will work. But let's say you know,
there's a development going on sometime in New South Wales
and we need the water board to approve this, and
we need someone else to do something rather, you know,
to connect up some power or pipes or something, and

(46:20):
the men's government is not sort of responding even though
lots of jaw burning happens. Would would Andrew Bray get
up there and sort of, you know, call the press
conference and just say this is not happened quick enough.
We've got the money ready to spend on these infrastructure
things that need to be spent on. We're not going
to ask the developer to do it. We want this
to happen. We need it to happen in order to

(46:41):
meet our guidelines for the one point two million or
wherever it is to fifty thou year houses. Chris Mins,
I'm calling you out. Can you get the water board
to do that?

Speaker 2 (46:51):
That is exactly what we would do. That's pretty balls
and we would call the press conference out the front
of the site.

Speaker 1 (46:58):
Well, that's ballsy, that's never I don't think it's happened
here before. That's what you need to do. Yeah, so
that doesn't get radical here.

Speaker 2 (47:04):
Yeah, well that is sort of radicake some risks and
not risk.

Speaker 1 (47:07):
Free for a politician to do that, but it's got
to happen. Yeah, no, totally, there is risk associated with that.
Dumb and I mean, I see you know Musket is
not electric politician. But at the same time he's sort
of doing a lot of bidding for over the American
and he uses X and things like that to call
things out all the time. I mean, will you will
you be aggressively pushing for these things to happen, like
using whatever mediums that are you know that you can

(47:29):
get access to you have to and a responsible way.

Speaker 2 (47:31):
You have to do otherwise the deep state eat you.
I mean, you just don't get things done. I mean,
for example, if you discover a corporate crime in Australia,
I would say reporting it to the media is more
effective than reporting it to ask they'll move faster. Like
sometimes getting people to do something that they want to
do is only going to happen if they feel a
bit of risk. Well, they feel a bit expired for them,

(47:51):
right for them now means it's a good guy, everyone
likes him, whatever. But if he wants to be the
housing premiere, he's got to get the agencies to do
the right thing.

Speaker 1 (48:00):
And so his agency meaning water boards, water board.

Speaker 2 (48:04):
The power people, whatever. So if if a federal government
comes along and says you're not doing this, we're putting
in our share, then he would feel very exposed. And
that's what we've got to do to get traction on
housing supply. So and I'm very high conviction of it.
I thought about it very carefully.

Speaker 1 (48:21):
Yeah, because then so I was going to say, you know, Andrew,
you're I mean, it's a big call, Like, I mean,
you're going to have to do it in every state.
Of course, it's not just Sydney or not. I shouldn't
be just picking on Chrismians. But this is this is
Australia wide. This issue.

Speaker 2 (48:33):
If if you go, if you go to Southwest Sydney
where a lot of the action is on housing, right,
you know that Liverpool, Camden, Campbelltown, LGAs can't talk to
the developers there. They'll say, well, we wanted to build
two hundred flats but we couldn't because Sydney Water wouldn't
turn the water on.

Speaker 1 (48:47):
You know, I've heard him say it, it's true. I've
actually heard him at the at the AFL summit with
Jennifer Hewett. I mean I heard them say this stuff.
You know, they're saying, you might have this goal of
one point two million houses, but we don't because it's
just not viable for us to do this.

Speaker 2 (49:03):
So I mean, like, but that's not how democracy works.
Mark the Premiere of the state, has said this is
his number one priority. He cannot be undermined by some
random agency. Like that's not right. Yeah, that's that's that is.

Speaker 1 (49:18):
I hate that me too. So your leader, Peter Dutton
and the rest of your party is everybody in supporters,
do you have to convince everybody of.

Speaker 2 (49:27):
Stuff we've alread announced, Peter's announced it. It's done.

Speaker 1 (49:30):
Five billion dollars we'll put on the table for now
that I'm talking about. You get in front of the
at the side of Brinelli or whatever is you're talking
about it and actually standing there saying calling him out.

Speaker 2 (49:39):
I think Peter has shown he understands unless you get
the houses built, then young people will pay, and he's
prepared to support that for sure.

Speaker 1 (49:47):
And what sort of traction are you getting you guys now?
I mean the lection's coming up because it's going to
be May. Obviously, you guys had a bit of a
magic run there for a while. You sort of slipped
back on the polls. How you feeling with all this now?
I mean, look, it's going to be a class selection.
It's all or nothing for you guys now.

Speaker 2 (50:06):
Yeah, and look, I think it's going to be pretty close.
We've got a better offering our challenges. How can we
talk to as many people as possible about these issues?
As you know, it's complex in many cases, and labor
is good. It's been good at politics, but overall I'd
rather be asked than them.

Speaker 1 (50:22):
Yeah, of course, otherwise you would just switch parties, but
you're but do you feel as that you're being effective?
I mean, I see Anthony is the Prime Minister with
the greatest respect, has been on all sorts of shows,
I mean ranging from all sorts of characters who have podcasts,
his very first podcast, so I'm proud to say with
us and it's true. But nonetheless he's been all over

(50:44):
the shop. He's sort of talking to everybody. Are you
guys prepared to do that? Because you talk to everybody.

Speaker 2 (50:49):
So I think Darton is one of those classic politicians
that the more people he meets, the more votes he gets,
because as you know, he's a fundamentally decent ones Disney guy.

Speaker 1 (50:58):
He's a decent guy what you see where you get
and pretty smart too.

Speaker 2 (51:01):
I think even if you don't agree with that, and
the thing that you have to like about him is
you know where he stands. You're not thinking, oh, this
guy's a bit une principled always you're I'm not sure
where he's going to go. You know where he's going
to go.

Speaker 1 (51:14):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (51:14):
I think that's really an important quality of leadership. So
I think because there's a lot of politicians I might't
name any of them, that the more people they meet,
the fewer votes they get. We've done. And I think
the more people he meets, the more votes he gets.

Speaker 1 (51:25):
Well to some extent. I mean I've seen this in
the political agendas through the verious election cycles, particularly last one.
In this one, there are a few politicians who the
party says, we don't want you out in front of everybody,
just stay behind the scenes. The more you speak that
those votes we get depends on the issue. I think, yeah,
it depends on the issue. And what do you think
of the big issues for this election? I mean, cost

(51:47):
living is a big one, but how would you guys
go about sort of aiding us in the cost of
living issue?

Speaker 2 (51:54):
Or energy is huge, right, making sure we have cheap
energy that's keep for small businesses, keep for households. The
housing issue is massive, the fact that so many young
people feel disaffected that the Australian dream is dead for them.
Those would be two of the biggest issues for us
at this campaign. And we've got quite different policies from
labor on housing and now on energy.

Speaker 1 (52:13):
Yeah. I saw the energy one in the budget reply,
the gas for the gas reservation and I think that
makes sense, That makes a lot of sense. I think
what most people don't. And I don't want to put
people down, but most people one didn't even know there's
a budget. They definitely don't know about the budget reply

(52:34):
on Thursday. They don't understand the word gas reservation. The
AFI does, Sinney Morning Herald do, and Telegraph and all those,
but you and I do. But generally speaking, most people
don't understand the significance of what gas reservation means. They
don't understand LMI, which you were talking about. How do
we sort of explain to people these You said, you've

(52:59):
got to ge it in front of more people, and
doun't's going to get in front of more people to
get that part? But how do you break down these
things into simple terms because they're complex thoughts. There's complexity
around it.

Speaker 2 (53:11):
Yeah, but people aren't Austrainers are not stupid. I think
generally people will understand these cond tips. And you start
with the outcome. Your energy prices are too high because
X Y z right, and in this case has been
enough gas. They've relied on renewables only for example. They
haven't looked at nuclear in the long term. Those are

(53:32):
sort of some of the answers on housing. We've talked
about it, right. The reason is not enough houses built
and not enough creativity to help first home buyers. As
we said before, the only country that we compare ourselves
to without any lending policy to help first an buyers.
So that's some of the reasons why it's.

Speaker 1 (53:51):
Quite interesting because you're the first politician who I've actually
had the conversation with that's ever talked about lending policy
relative to first time bise. I mean, I saw Donet
announced something about it earlier this week. I think it's

(54:11):
ear lest. We may have been late last week, but
you're the first long form politician, long form conversation that
I've seen. Sure, it appears in the fin Review and
appears in the Citney Morning Held, and it might appear
in the Teally, et cetera. But and even if it does,
it's not guaranteed to be read by most people. It

(54:32):
just seems to me that it needs to be. And
I don't want to go back to the American style,
but American style nearly rally style. You nearly really need
to be standing in front of fifty people and the
next day another fifty bill, the next day another hundred people,
and explaining to them this sort of stuff. I mean,
being on Charlotte, this is good because it's long form

(54:52):
and there's you know, it's an opportunity for me to
ask questions and sort of to try and work and
all that with alongside with you. But and my audience
is prett big audience. But they might see this, but
they might have watched the whole thing. They might only
listen to part of it. They might not really get it,
and they might go on to the next proper show
we show and forget about the conversation between here and
the election day. I just wonder is there another way

(55:16):
that someone like you, Andrew, you know, like you know,
a boy from Shepard and like if you ever thought
yourself what to be better? Is there a better way
that you could talk about this sort of stuff and
not rely on the normal mediums, particularly like you know,
like digital mediums that we have now the old form
mediums were actually which is what Trump was great at,
actually old four mediums. I mean he did all the
new ones, but he's the old ones like that he

(55:37):
was look like to me because when I get glued
to the television when there's an election on particularly American election,
it was nearly twenty four hours a day, a guy's
nearly eighty years of age. I was marveling at him,
and by the way, you know, to some extent, Kamala
was sort of doing the same thing. But I was
marveling at the energy of these individuals in the amount
of time they put into it. It is a big deal.

(55:58):
It's a presidential election. It's different a what we do.
But we nearly need someone in every department, like your department,
to prosecute Labor's guilty of the same stuff. By the way,
in fact, I've heard less. I don't think I've heard
anything from your equivalent in fact, and I have to
say to the audience, this guy drove me mad to

(56:19):
get on the show. Like I'm not doing him a favor.
He wanted to come on the show and rack somehow
I found my EA and everything, Like Andrew Rag's on
the phone. He wants to know when he's going to
the show, So that's pretty important. I've I've heard nothing
from Labor. Nothing. The only person's trying to get on
the show is Jim Chalmers. Obviously alb and easy, but
Chalmers has us to come on. But other than that, nobody.

(56:41):
It's like Australian politicians don't get it. We want you
to talk to us, We want you to talk to
us more and more and more and more and more.
Do you ever, in your moments dream about how you
might be able to do this more often and better
or is there no better way?

Speaker 2 (56:59):
Well, I think YouTube is now a magnificent platform for
politicians to talk about governor YouTube, right, we think that's
really good. Secondly, podcasters like you that have a big
audience is a fantastic medium for us because no one
is watching the news that they used to, or very
few people watch the National nine news.

Speaker 1 (57:19):
Well they've already heard it before it gets on television.

Speaker 2 (57:21):
So we think it's very important. And then, more broadly,
you rely on word of mouth. So in relation to
a lending change, I would be hoping that the mortgage
breaking associations and bodies will now be telling all their
members about our changes. And then when a person walks
into a mortgage breaking shop, maybe in the South Coast

(57:42):
in South Wales or something, to buy a first house,
mortgage broker would say to them, well, maybe not in
these exact terms, but if the Coalition wins the election,
your loan buffer will be two percent, not three percent
for example.

Speaker 1 (57:56):
Well, okay, what about if I said to you, what
about our introduced you to any came from the advisor
which talks to them all, so that's our when this
is from magazine. Yeah, and I should declare my brother
owns a part of that, but it doesn't matter. But
if I said to you, that's the most read magazine
by seventeen thousand brokers, every broker in the country reads

(58:16):
everybody does, have you maybe should do an interview with
it then?

Speaker 2 (58:20):
So I have before And that's exactly the idea. So
the idea is then the mortgage breaker sits in front
of the Australian person and then explains to them how
our policy would work and how it will be different
to the labor parties.

Speaker 1 (58:34):
That's an important part of this because I think you
touch a lot of people that way, right. You want
the mortage ready to be talking about it, that's right,
and you want and mortgage brokers would like to know
the Liberal Party for example, or the Light Party, but
is in their corner. So you know, one of the
other issues that you know the mortgage broker might like
to hear from you, you know through the advisor, is

(58:55):
is this, you believe that the moreage brokers important, and
that you want to let the blank banks screw the
mortge broker because mortgage broguers are terrified and I don't
even know how this could possibly happen legally, that the
bank's are all going to gang up and somehow crush

(59:17):
the mortgage broken industry and put everyone back to a
position where they have to go individually back to their
own bank and we're never going back to from home line. Well,
if you spoke to the mortgage brokes and he said
we're never going to let that happen again, We're never
going to go back to that, that would get every
mortgage brokeer in the country supporting just everything you do,

(59:38):
particularly if you can help their first time buyers buy
a home more readily. I mean, and I wonder whether
you should be talking to people like the Advisor and
there is another one or two other magazines, but who
talked to brogus. I mean, I got fifteen hundred brokers
who work for me, of which probably they've got three
or four, three or four mostly the three or four
brokers working for them, So got thousands of people working
for us. They're exclusive to us. That's the question that

(01:00:01):
always asks me which government right now, which government is
going to look after us the most, because at the
end of the day, voters vote for what's in it
for them. That's right, every one of us. We're not
really thinking about what's in it for anybody else. We're
thinking about what's in it for us first. I understand
that's our mentality, and I'm thinking about what's wanted. I

(01:00:22):
want to know which party who's up for election he's
going to look after my business, my people, because I'm
out there trying to look after my people, my brokers.
And if you guys would be prepared to talk but
to talk to the advisor and actually make these sorts
of commitments and maybe Label would do anyway, but I

(01:00:44):
don't know that will go a long way to getting
people to pay attention to listen to you, because if
you can show someone what's in it for me, they
will then prosecute what's in it for you.

Speaker 2 (01:00:53):
Yeah, and we want the brokers to be writing more
and more loans for first time by its, because it's
pretty hard to get a first house that our mortgage.

Speaker 1 (01:01:01):
And it's very hard to get the moves out there. Broker. Yeah,
but these days, because because loans are complicated and brokers
know the rules that if particularly if you bring rules
in like this, these sort of rules where it's only
two percent, for example, in the threshold, a borrower doesn't
know that. I mean, you might say it a thousand
times over, but they may never have read the paper
or listened to the publication where he said it. Whereas

(01:01:22):
a broker that's their job to know it. They will
know it. Yeah, And I just mean, I'm so glad
that you raise this issue because you know, I'm going
to contact the advice and I'm going to give contact
you and talk to you if you don't mind. Yeah, good, Yeah,
because it's a good thing for them to know that
someone's batten for the broken industry.

Speaker 2 (01:01:41):
We like them because they provide competition right in a
totally industry which is desperately in need of competition. And
the banks are highly protected as species with the four
pills policy. Plus the bank can guarantee you like. I
don't think we owe the banks any favors. I think,
in fact, the banks are the Aralian people the best
posible deal they can give people, rather than trying to

(01:02:02):
presume other parts of the value chain, so I think
that's important. Look also, I've had good experience with breakers
in my own my own life. But I think a
lot of politicians probably don't don't sit in front of
a financial planner or mortgage back all that often, and
I think that actually impedes their ability to understand how
federal regulation can be deployed or not deployed to help people.

Speaker 1 (01:02:27):
And if if you don't mind, I just I'll make
us a little comment bit more looking seeking some guidance
from you in relation to what you guys are thinking
about for this selection. But in Australia, banking is controlled
by a few banks. Yeah, there's lots of banks, but
largely controlled by a few banks. Insurance is controlled by

(01:02:48):
a few a few insurance companies. Retailers controlled by a
few retailers. Telco is controlled by a few telcos, et cetera.
You think about that as a party.

Speaker 2 (01:03:01):
We're a nation of oligopolies. And this is what I've
always been procrypto because I always thought that if you
can get crypto to help disrupt and to get lower
prices and better choices, different choices to Australians, like you know,
the international remittances is one of the best use cases
for crypto. That's got to be a good thing. But
you've got to make sure that you harness that rather

(01:03:23):
than just export all those ideas to do bio to Singapore.
So generally speaking, I'm worried that we are a nation
of oligopolies because I think it could be massively disrupted overnight.

Speaker 1 (01:03:35):
Yeah, and that's what oligopolies do. Though they tend to
stop any sort of disruption that's bad because they lose
part of their power base and therefore they or they
don't acting in concert. They're not acting, they're not colluding,
but they sort of all know what each other does,
so they just stay where it is and have all
hab it to have a twenty five percent of the

(01:03:56):
market or twenty percent of the market or over the
case won't be And if we grow one or gay
down by one doesn't really matter. It's about maintaining our
profitability and actually trying to somehow increase our margins. And
that's that's the sort of a definition of mologopoly. It's
funny enough when when I was a kid, not a kid,
when I was a much younger man, I wrote an
article in the fin Review about oligopolies in a relations

(01:04:19):
to the banking industry. And my father who's passed away,
but he's Greek, and he said, my mother, who's not Greek,
she used to read the Finishry of all the times.
She put this one article in front of my dad,
and dad said, Mark, He said, I really like that word.
Oligopoly or legal or legal, poorly or illegal means few.

(01:04:44):
Poorly means many, few control many, just a few control many,
as opposed to monopoly, which one controls everyone, duopoly to
control of me. But oligopoli is just illegal, means a
few small amounts of illegal. And it's interesting. My dad
got it straight up. And you know he's didn't go

(01:05:07):
to university, didn't even go to school, and he worked
in factory most of his life. But people understand simple concepts,
and there's not wrong that a few control everyone. But
it also explains to us why prices can.

Speaker 2 (01:05:24):
Be kept high.

Speaker 1 (01:05:27):
My access to certain things can be constrained just to
the elite, which is actually like, I really like your
idea about the threshold stuff, you know, reducing that making
home loans more accessible, but only accessible, I should say,
and more accessible to one cohort of people, younger people

(01:05:50):
perhaps or whatever. First time by is it's a it's
a bloody good policy and it's about time that I
think is about time that it's interesting liberal are sort
of going more to the middle. I don't know's it's
working class territories where labor used to play and liberals
are sort of moving into that territory. It's quite an

(01:06:14):
interesting change in the politics. And I don't think most
people know that.

Speaker 2 (01:06:17):
We've always been the promoters of home ownership, though if
you go back to the means his age, we were
always a party of home ownership.

Speaker 1 (01:06:24):
Well, John Howard in two thousand and two, always two
thousand and one, I think it was certainly one election,
like it was affordability. He launched affordability program in Adelaide.
I remember we launched it, launched the election for that.
In that period, I was around home affordability because I
remember because I funded a young man who did a
study on a PhD study on this. That was Joy.

Speaker 2 (01:06:47):
Yeah, Chris Joy, who launched it.

Speaker 1 (01:06:49):
And the reason I founded is because he was working
for Malcolm Turnbull who was at Gold and Saxson. Mal
Malcolm rang me and I remember I funded the as
a young bloke. So we didn't have any money. You
needed something to fund the study of it, which this is.

Speaker 2 (01:07:02):
The means he's research one.

Speaker 1 (01:07:03):
Yeah. Yeah, that was Chris Joy and Chris was sitting
in that chair only three.

Speaker 2 (01:07:07):
Hours ago, Is that right?

Speaker 1 (01:07:08):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (01:07:09):
Crazy.

Speaker 1 (01:07:09):
He's a good made of mine. So but but I
remember it well. It wasn't a good friend of mine
at the time because I was introduced him through Malcolm,
but it was. It's interesting it's still the major issue affordability,
and that's twenty four years ago and I'm hoping someone
will solve it this round.

Speaker 2 (01:07:28):
Well, I think we're going to have a good crack
at it with our supply and our demand side policies,
which are so different from whatever Labour's offering.

Speaker 1 (01:07:36):
So it's totally different. It's different to anything I've heard before.
So that I want to say congratulations the best, like
look just for that, Just for that, I hope you
guys win. Thank you, thank you, I really did just
for that, because I'm going to put a smile lot
of Australians faces And that's all I'm interested in is
Australians getting a roof over the heads. That's the most
important thing to me. Yeah, that's my mission too good

(01:07:57):
good to see him.

Speaker 2 (01:07:58):
Thanks marks back.