September 30, 2025 • 58 mins
Paul Scully is a 51-year-old lifelong Wollongong local and the current NSW Minister for Planning and Public Spaces, serving as the Member for Wollongong since 2016.
In this episode, we dive into his family heritage and education, the political background and dynamics that shaped his career, and his perspective on raising the standard of living and government responsibility. We break down the challenges around housing supply and planning reforms, explore how political decisions play out in communities, and discuss innovative government policies designed to tackle today’s pressing issues. Paul also shares how he balances budget pressures with policy implementation, before looking ahead to his future plans and legislative reforms for NSW.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Welcome to the Mentor. I'm Mark Boris Paul Scully. Welcome
to the Mentor.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Mate, thanks very much, thanks for having me on.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
And I hope you appreciate that I'm dressed in my
podcasting gear, but you're looking magnificent there in your ministerial outfit.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
I prefer to be dressed in the podcasting gear to
be honest with you, be more comfortable.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
And let's just establish it. So we're doing this the
couple of days before the Grand Final. I'm not sure
when we're going to go there with this show, but
doesn't matter. I need to know straight up. Who do
you go for in rugby league.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
I'm a Dragons fan, but as a boyfriend the Gong
recovering Steelers fan, I think is best.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
Just wow. Yeah, so you're Dragons and because of this.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Yeah, because of the merger. Yeah yeah, so after twenty
eight years, I should get over it and just move on.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
To sure s George's will warr anyway? Yeah, absolutely, see
you're from the Gong.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
I am born and raised, born and.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
Raised and by the way, Peter of Lentnesses too, Yes, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Cra High, where my dad went a few years before.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Peter though Okay, So tell me a little bit about
your background, because we're very rare to do our do
audiences get to anyone voters for them. It gets too
much about people's backgrounds when they're in Parliament especially, and
people actually believe not really interested in that stuff. So
tell me a little bit about the Scully family. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
So my mum moved here from post World War II
Germany when she was five, and my dad's families of
Irish descent. He was a truck driver his entire life.
Mum was a cleaner, and then they went on to
own their own small business at airport shuttle service that
they ran. But yeah, born and raised in the Gong
(01:43):
and my wife is the federal MP for that area.
So where one of those strange and rare couples that
are really lockstep in terms of our professional lives. Political family, Yeah,
full political family. Yeah so yeah, federal MP, State MP
one one house.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
When you said your mom and dad had a business
withsin airport shuttles, are you saying that they were shuttling
people from the ill warred district will Go and blah
blah blah to Sydney Airport.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Yep, absolutely yes, So they used to have a number.
I think they got to four at the end, twelve
seedar buses so people could drive them on a standard license,
and they do a few trips a day across those
to either the airport to drop people off to go
on holidays or business pick people up and take them
back home, or go to cruise ships as well.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
And your mum actually born in Germany.
Speaker 2 (02:35):
She was Yeah, she was born in Ninburg and emigrated
when she was five.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
Did Why did the family come to Australia.
Speaker 2 (02:44):
My grandfather's Latvian and my grandmother's German, And they decided
that post World War two Germany wasn't the place where
they'd have a good opportunity. So they had a couple
of options. So there was a line to go to
migrate to Canada and a line to migrate to Australia.
The line to migrate to Australia was a bit shorter,
(03:06):
so they jumped in that one and yeah, lo and
behold here we are. Mum ended up moving to Wollongong,
or to Mount Kembler, a small mining village outside of Wollongong,
in the early couple of years after she got there,
and hasn't hasn't left that village since.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
You know, it's interesting about that because I happen to
know someone who has exactly the same grandparent heritage Latvian
and German. And it's interesting fact, I presume the same
exists in your family. But during the war, prior to
the World War Two, the Russians always had eyes for
(03:49):
Latvia and Estonia and Lithuania, et cetera. And you know,
probably similar to the geopolitical conflict that's going on to
the moment in that part of the world. And Germany
befriended Latvian said listen, we'll protect it from the Russians.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Because it didn't work.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
What's going to happen? And and a lot of a
lot of and Germany went into latviin and it didn't
work out that well. And of course the war started
with Russia et cetera. But it didn't work at that well,
and poor or Laffey was sort of stuck in between
let's call it two enemies. And but a lot of
Latvian people, as as I understood it from the conversation
(04:26):
I have with this family, actually decided to marry German
soldiers and women will marry a German soldier and because
they felt like as though they would be the get
some sort of level of protection by doing that. And
then that a lot of them actually emigrated to Adelaide.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
Yeah, that's right. And they've got a strong, strong German
heredage in that and that's that's right. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
And then one one family who I can sort of
I don't mind naming, actually is the you might be
too young to remember, but the very famous family is
called the Spalvin's family. John Spalvins, who is a Latvian
but his mother end up remarrying because his father was
unfortunately killed but during the war, but his mother remarried
a German soldier and whose name was bloomin Tel's, which
(05:17):
as I understand, means blooming Valley in German. And they
emigrated to South Australia. And quite a number of these
individuals actually in the small businesses could be involved in
them wine industry or something like that, particularly in Adelaide,
and a great contributors to the Australian, to Australia in
terms of you know, effort, great contributors and more. I
(05:38):
look at you, I can see there's you got the
people maybe they're watching on the camera or your camera
number two. He's got striking blue eyes and you actually
I can see that the likeness from the northern Europe
and the people from Latvia. Germans we know a lot
more about, but Lafa we know a little about. But
amazingly well educated people unbelievable things like music. Music is
(06:03):
a huge part of their life. Huge and is your mum.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Is your mum still by the way they are, Yeah,
mum and dads still are so unfortunate with that, but yeah,
they instilled that in Mum particularly, you know, insisted that
I learned an instrument when I was younger, and I
ended up studying piano for thirteen years right through primary
school and high school, so you doing. I didn't do
(06:30):
it in the HC. No, I was a bit more boring.
I did economics and maths and physics and chemistry, so
very much not on the creative side of things in
that sense. But I kept up the music because it
was just a diversion from from other things that you
had to do. So I'd managed to squeeze all of
that together with a bit of work, part time work
as well.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
So I did the same thing I did music and
the h and and I don't do anymore, but only
because keep my mum happy. But my mum's irish, but
like kept I'm happy. But but one thing I've learned
about that, and maybe you just mentioned maths and economics,
one thing I learned is later on life is that
music at a young age, particularly piano, is very instructive
(07:13):
informative for young people to become good at maths.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Yeah, that was I think that was part of the
reason because I ended up doing it because I was
getting in trouble at primary school and year like year
two or something, I was at the principal's office more
than I was at my desk, and the principal said
it was a small school, Mount Kembler. I think by
the time I left in year six there were ninety
six kids enrolls. I was small, right, And the principal said, well,
(07:38):
he's bored, so give him something that's going to challenge him.
And my grandmother, for whatever reason, had a piano at
her place. It was the heaviest thing known to my
rights uprights cast iron inside you know, sixteen people made
sort of move it and that was that was how
piano was chosen. Because there was an instrument there because
(07:58):
mom and dad couldn't afford it anything else for us.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
So that's amazing. So, like I always, I find it fascinating.
Maybe other people don't, but I find it fascinating when
someone has that sort of sort of story. And what
do you as a kid, Well, if you remember back
as a kid and today you're a politician and you're
a minister, and when you are the minister for I'm
going to get us right now, planning planning in publics
(08:21):
and public spaces right And we'll talk about that in
a moment. But what do you think that that upbringing,
with that sort of background left you with in relation
to how you live your life as a as a
as a minister today.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
Yeah, I think the thing that was instilled in most
is work hard no matter what you do. And mom
and dad weren't ever worried about what myself or my
brother or my sister would end up doing in life.
It was just make sure you tried hard at school
to go as far as you could. I was the
first of my family to go to university.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
Where where do you sit in terms of brothers system?
Speaker 2 (08:58):
I'm the oldest, so that helped. But but you know,
so just try and get a good education, try and
make a good deal in life. And as dad said,
don't don't end up as a truck driver like he did.
He goes us too hard work, that is it.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
By the way, truck driving is hard. Yeah, was he
doing long haul driving?
Speaker 2 (09:18):
No, he was doing a lot around the steel works,
mainly and local stuff. But you know B doubles, you know,
from from sort of coal body trucks to B doubles.
There was enough work around the steel works at times
to keep him well and truly busy. But in order
to pay the mortgage and keep us fed and clothed
and everything, it meant double ships. So there wasn't too
(09:38):
many days of the week where Dad wasn't wasn't working
even though he was employed at the time by someone,
he wasn't an owner driver. But yeah, he still had
to work hard to keep the money coming in.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
Do you feel grateful to your parents? Just not so
much for what they told you, but for what you
saw them do extraordinarily, Like it's the mens, haven't I
don't want to. I'm not here to blow smoke up
anyone's you know what, But I have to say, like
you know, some liberal party people will get really upset
(10:10):
with me saying this, But I've been a big fan
of the Men's Government, and I mean I interviewed Daniel
your Treasurer movie recently, and I've obviously I've interviewed the
premiere before. The Men's Government seems to and Stephen, you know,
they go, you, your minister, what's Stephen? Minnesota?
Speaker 2 (10:28):
Minnesota jobs, tourism, a small business, small business.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
And it seems to me that all of you guys
down to worth come from normal families, hard working families,
have got really good values pretty much not left, not right.
You're sort of sitting in the middle somewhere, and you
(10:53):
get it like it's just I mean, I don't know,
you know, it literally is my first conversation with you.
But I'm getting that sent straight up.
Speaker 2 (11:00):
There's there's there's not no airs and graces on some
of us, like we all came most of us came
through public education system, have have lived in our communities
for a long time, so seen the good and the bad,
and genuinely there to to try and make a difference
to those people, to make that make it easier for
the next generation coming through, you know, and that shuld
(11:22):
that's sort of always been the Australian social contract, you know,
is that everyone should be there and if they can
use their position to make to raise the standard of living,
make it easier for those who are coming through after you.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
So we are going to talk about the standard living
and how New South Wales government, you know, the men's
government at the moment, and in particularly your contribution, how
you direct yourself towards raising the stand living because I
think just as a punter, I think and I'm lucky
my stand living is a certain level because I've had
some lack of my life, But most Australians have been
(11:58):
going backwards by most measures on standard living. And let's
just talk about New South Wales. I'm probably more so
the case in New South well because we're the biggest,
most populous stable maybe, but it doesn't matter. We you know,
we have we got people here who are they're stand
living sound backwards and it relates to housing and relates
to everything and you know, jobs and what opportunities, and
(12:21):
I do want to talk to about that because I
think that is the most important fundamental value that governments
need to governm for, apart from safety and make sure
we're enough water and we've got the roads or all
that sort of stuff, but just my standard of living,
you know, how I live my life. Can I afford
to live in this house? Can I afford them mortgage
(12:42):
like your dad and mum always trying to make sure
of Can I afford the rent if you're just renting?
Can I afford to send my kids to soccer and
or maybe get my daughters taught another or musical instrument.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
And as we live longer, can we afford our retirements?
Speaker 1 (12:58):
That is the critical one.
Speaker 2 (13:00):
And this is all of the tensions that are playing
themselves out. And while it doesn't sound like the immediate
portfolio that would have a great deal of influence on it,
planning does. That's because it's about how we most efficiently
use our land to advance the economic, social, and environmental
(13:21):
needs of the state for the future. For the future.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
Absolutely, I'm really glad to raise that we're living longer
thing because I met I had John Howard here last
this week actually, and I was talking to about a
variety of things. We're talking about some of the great
policies of previous governments, and we hit on poor Keating's
(13:44):
compulsory super innovation or the super innovation Guarantee for employees,
which is one of the great on a global basis.
It's one of the great policies ever been put into place,
and not only just to make sure that you know,
individuals employees, one day we'll have some money retire, but
on the flip side, taking the burden away from government
having to provide from when they do retire, because most
(14:05):
countries in the world they're broke if you look at
the liability they have Japan.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
Japan is a real challenge with an aging population, and
we've got a similarly aging population, but we've been able
to cater for elephant elements of it by making the
big calls some time ago. That allows them to go through.
It allows compound interest. What is it the eighth grade
wonder of the world. I said, it's there's time needed
(14:34):
for that to really take effect. So by the Hawk
and Keyting governments making those calls in conjunction with the
labor movement at the time through the accord process, that
allowed a lot of people who would have relied only
and solely on the pension to set themselves up for life,
(14:55):
for a comfortable retirement, and my parents among them. They've
been able to turn their hard work through their business
in the end primarily into something that set them up comfortably.
And they're not wealthy by any way, shape or form,
but they're comfortable. If you're comfortably will that's right exactly.
(15:15):
And they know that they can go about their life
and not have to think terribly much about what they do.
They're not got extravagance lives, but they've got a life
that they know that they'll be able to feed themselves.
If they get sick, they'll be able to pay for
any doctors or anything like that, they'll be able to
get around and if they need it in time hopefully,
(15:36):
but if they need it in time, they'll be able
to get some help in at home. And that sort
of time they've exactly and they don't have to then
worry about calling on the rest of the family to
try and do that, particularly as they're raising their own kids.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
So that's social contract it is that they've now enjoyed
that they got from previous governments. Whether a liberal labor
it doesn't really matter to me. To me, that's gold
for those individually your parents. We are now have a
whole cohort of younger people who I recently I've actually
(16:12):
engaged in an actually to do this work for me
to say, if a young person lives beyond eighty one,
which is the age of Australia male eighty two for
female thereabouts, if they live to ninety one, but they're
only putting enough money away under the current actually.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
Where calculations when would they run out?
Speaker 1 (16:32):
Correct? So they either got to work longer post sixty
five with the assumes you leave the sixty five assumes
you make a certain amount per annum on the contributions
at nine, ten, eleven two percent. However it has been so,
but the assumption is also they're going to spend it
all and die at eighty one.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
There also assumes that you're secure in your housing. And
you got that was the other paint was part of it, right.
The assumption was for the vast majority of people, they'd
get to the point of retirement where they own their
own correct, and we're only doing maintenance to keep it going.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
And now we've got these things.
Speaker 2 (17:04):
Now we've got a big challenge with that, and that's
what's eroding some fundamental.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
So do you guys talk with this? Do you guys?
When I see you guys, you you know the senior
people are in parliament, sit arounds in your parliament, state parliament,
and you said the last state government. Do you sit
around and say, well, I mean I loved enough. This
conversation gets had. You know, we've got to play our
part in the national game. But it's really federal government
can't do much about any this anyways. Mostly state governments
(17:29):
do it anyway, and or counsels. Do you sit around say,
you know, my kids, your kids, maybe they won't have
the same outcome as you and or your parents will have.
When your kids are sixty five seventy seventy five, they
might not own their own home because they might ever
be able to afford to get one one two, They
(17:51):
may not have enough superheros because the medical health technology
are going to make them live longer anyway, even though
they don't want it. It's going to make them live longer.
But they won't live the life that your mum and
dad live. You just said your mom and didn't have
the same as my mom, and they had the luxury
of having an annual holiday and it's just a balanous nothing.
(18:13):
Fancy owning their own car and maybe able to get
a new cavery five years, not having to pay the
mortgage obs so they've got security of their own home,
being able to leave something to the kids, because that's
the big thing in their lives, leave them for the kids,
and be able to go to the hospital if they
need to go the doctor, they need to get transport off,
they need to and put reasonable food on the table.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
Well, we do we talk about that in the context
of the challenges we've got to face.
Speaker 1 (18:41):
Right, So actual conversational versations.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
Maybe it might be one on one or small groups
or the like, but it's trying to work through some
of those challenges. So and the big one that we've
been working through that directly is in my portfolio responsibilities,
or at least it has a big contribution to it.
How do we build more homes in New South Wales,
How do we make sure that New South Wales is
attracting international investment to create help create jobs, and how
(19:08):
do we make sure that the economy is working as
best it can when it comes to balancing up the
varying needs of conflicting land use opportunities throughout not only
Sydney but throughout the entire state. And that's the essence
of the planning portfolio.
Speaker 1 (19:26):
So, Paul, if you don't mind, forgot, just let's look
at housing for example, dwellings necessarily talking about houses, but anytime.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
We do it it's a roof ovor someone's hand exactly.
Speaker 1 (19:36):
Yeah, And I think you know the old system, you know,
we all greats train dream is to have a house.
But these days I think younger people have different views
on it, and younger people have a different sort of
interaction with societally. I mean a lot of them. Let's
just like to join up and go on holidays Gold
Coast or whatever they want to do. Where does your
(19:57):
portfolio fit into that part? Just Housing South Wales contribution
to the one point two million houses over what it
was announce SLEPT I think two.
Speaker 2 (20:07):
Years ago yep. So over the five years to mid
twenty twenty nine, New South Wales's contribution is three hundred
and seventy thousand, seventy seven thousand new homes in total.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
And we've already had a year a year yep. How
far where are you at?
Speaker 2 (20:23):
We're further behind than what we'd like. When we were elected,
the forecast for that five year period was one hundred
and a year no total to five years one hundred
and eighty thousand, was it? So we're trying to crank
it up.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
That was your forecast?
Speaker 2 (20:37):
That was yeah, that was what we got. When you
become a minister, they give you the thing known as
the Incoming Government Minister's Brief, and you looked at that
and one of the first glaring statistics I saw there
is the forecast for home building in New South Wales
over the next five years is one hundred and eighty
thousand homes. Now we've got a target of three hundred
and seventy seven thousand homes. That's a big gap we
had to close. And part of that is because we
(21:00):
simply haven't been building enough over a long period of time.
So over the last couple of decades we've been building
six homes per thousand people, and what per thousand people
in New South Wales so yeah, yeah a year and
Victoria and Queensland have been building eight and nine per thousand.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
The building more.
Speaker 2 (21:20):
Yeah, And then you overlay that with another challenge of
an aging population, because the proportion of single person households
is going to grow to roughly the same size as
the proportion of two adults two kids. But each and
each change each decimal place change in the average number
(21:40):
of people in a house in New South Wales in
Australia rather adds about one hundred and six one hundred
and the need for one hundred and sixty thousand new
dwellings in total. Well, right, so that's a big dynamic
and a big change in and of itself. Overlay that
with the fact that Sydney has become the second least
(22:01):
at least affordable city on the planet. Beaten on the planet,
we're only beaten by Hong Kong. That's not good. And
we're the eight hundred and fifty ninth least dense city
on the planet. Now those two things are related, all right,
So not building enough home least densely, so we've got
less density in fact as it was a bizar eight
(22:21):
hundred and fifty ninth break. Yeah, we're not ranking high there,
all right, we should.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
That's sort of good.
Speaker 2 (22:27):
Well, yes, yes, yeah, yes, and no, it just means
we've spread out right a lot. Now, Sydney, that's fine,
but where you start to run into problems. You've got
a National park at the north and at the south
and at the west and then in the northeast. Sorry,
northwest you've got one of the largest un mitigated floodplains
(22:49):
in the country, so yeah, and in the Southwest you've
got some challenges of fire, bushfire and some flood affectation
as well. So it's only so much Sydney can physically grow.
So that's why we have to increase the amount of
density we do. And it's also changing the way that
(23:09):
reflects how people like, a changing preference and the way
people live. An interesting stat that the government architect gave
me in a very early briefing. She said to me,
did I know that we've got less diversity in our
housing types today than what we did in the early
nineteen hundred?
Speaker 1 (23:24):
What does that mean?
Speaker 2 (23:26):
We either have really tall buildings or single dwellings and
not much in between. So the terraces and the townhouses
and the dual occupancies that have been around you see
them around the place. A lot of those in various
parts of Sydney were effectively banned because of rules in
the planning system. It was bizarre. So in state planning, yeah,
(23:47):
local government, but in local government these often were So
it was a bizarre situation where you know, the terraces
of Surrey Hills and those sort of areas that have
been subject a huge protest in the past to protect
them and keep them. You couldn't build that type of
home in most of Sydney anymore. Not only could you
(24:08):
not build it, you weren't even able to put in
a planning proposal for it. Why not just the rules
said no, we're not we're not allowing this housing type anymore,
which is just crazy. Right. Similarly, there'd be blocks that
were zoned to take a medium density, so a small
residential apartment four to six stories, and then they'd say, oh,
you can do a small residential apartment there, but your
(24:30):
limits nine meters in height, so of course that's only
two stories, so it just doesn't work right. So these
are the crazy things we had to unpick and start
to unpick, which is which is what we've been doing
over the last couple of years. And then there's some
other reforms that we've introduced to I've introduced last in
the last sitting week to the Parliament.
Speaker 1 (24:49):
So maybe you can explain a few things to me,
like so in terms of what you can build somewhere exactly,
maybe you get explaned how state government rules or planning
rules are overlay for local planning rules.
Speaker 2 (25:09):
So basically the state government system, the Environmental Planning and
Assessment Act, been around since nineteen seventy nine, changed a
lot over that period, but that's when it was first
put in place. That has set out some rules, that's
the enabling piece of legislation, and then councils set up
their own strategic planning for their particular council area and
(25:29):
that's we work out what the rules are in a
particular area. And what's happened is over time, whether as
a result of community activism, political advantage, that someone perceived
that some of those things have been really tightened in
terms of what you can build in much of not
only Sydney but New South Wales. In order to make
(25:52):
sure that we do have a good mix of housing
types for people, we've got to relax some of those things.
That's what we've been progressingly doing over the last couple
of years. There was a thing called the missing middle right,
which basically says that there's a middle in between really
really high and single dwelling in density. Yeah, in density right,
so this is your townhouses, your terraces, your dual lock
have been sees those sort of things, and a lot
(26:13):
of that you couldn't build, right, So we've had to
refer to all yes, because you weren't. You weren't the
planning rules wouldn't allow you to submit applications for those
sort of homes in a lot of areas. So we've
reduced that, removed that restriction in one hundred and seventy
one locations across and between the Hunter and the Yellow
(26:34):
Warra so far saying castle to Mountain to Wollongong yep
and saying that you can build these sort of things
in these areas that are close to either transport or
town centers and the like.
Speaker 1 (26:46):
So that's in one hundred and seventy Is that at
like one hundred and seventy railway stations.
Speaker 2 (26:50):
Yeah, railway stations or town centers or so for instance
that it might be coralmel In my own areas one
there's both a railway center and a town center. So
you can, you know, you can change the types of
dwellings you can put in there to allow additional density,
get people it back in to those areas and allow
people to get into a home.
Speaker 1 (27:12):
Is this the rule that I read about that said
in order to get to get that allowance. It was
sort of limited to eight hundred meters from a railway station.
Speaker 2 (27:24):
So this one is within the eight hundred meters.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
So if someone's got to a house for eight hundred
meters within a railway station, if it's one of those
ones that you've put under, I guess this comes under
some relations. Yeah, low and mid rise, and then one
of those people of two people get together, like in
next door, maybe you can maybe put in an application
(27:46):
to pull it down and build correct du like or
three stories or something exactly exactly, and suddenly a small
house on a large block for one family could become
homes for multiple families. When you do that, and when
you guys have to push that through parliament, I guess
you have to get through them both.
Speaker 2 (28:06):
Or this one was largely regular tree so that change.
We didn't have to run the gauntlet of Macquarie Street
on this one, but some other stuff that's doing that.
But yeah, you just change regulations, which sounds simple, but
it's got a you know, it's not often not always welcome.
Speaker 1 (28:21):
What are the political considerations though when you do that?
Like so I saw I remember when the premiere announced
it got a lot of pushback in the media like
a big time who wore the people opposed to it?
Why would they be posed?
Speaker 2 (28:36):
Well, bizarrely enough, they're often longer term residents of a
particular area who don't want to see their streets and
suburbs change.
Speaker 1 (28:43):
They don't want to change.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
No, they don't want to change. Change is hard. Changes
can be confronting. The change shouldn't be scary, but you
know you'll get various pushbacks. And this because often it's
those who are already in an area have a loud
voice as opposed to those who may want to live
in an area in the future, whose voices often aren't
found in this sort of in these sort of debates,
(29:06):
in these public discussions. So because you know, if someone's
living in a rental property at the moment, they don't
know where they might end up in the future. They
don't know what the community is that they might want
to end up in, so their voices sometimes not heard.
So I have to be part of that voice. It
wasn't so much a political consideration, it was more a
capacity consideration. So it was looking at where can you
(29:29):
get enough you know, where is there a full line
supermarket nearby that you can get all your groceries that
you need to live. Is there public transport available, whether
it be train, metro, light rail or bus. Is there
water and sewer capacity in that particular area, Because if
there's water and sewer capacity, it means that Sydney Water
(29:50):
or Hunter Water in the Hunter doesn't have to make
big investments in order to facilitate growth there, which means
that overall it's cheaper societally new infrastructure. Yeah, that's right.
So if you don't have to go investing in that.
The Productivity Commissioner worked out between a site in a
green field area and an infield area the difference could
(30:10):
be as much as seventy five thousand dollars dwelling.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
Right, So it's a huge difference and where it's also
where people want to live. You know, people do want
to live differently. Now we're not saying you do only infield.
There's still some green field activity going on because people
do want to live in that. But what we're saying
is we've got to rebalance things in Sydney, particularly around
where there's been the big transport investments, the big investments
(30:34):
in metros. You know, you shouldn't nowhere in the world
would you walk out of a multi billion dollar metro
transport system and look across the road and there's a
couple of Californian single story bungalows with a pool in
the backyard. It just doesn't happen, right, And that's the
growth of Sydney as a global city. That's the changing
expectation of people who now want to live there. I'm
(30:55):
an apartment dweller, right, so I live in an apartment in
central Wollongong. Love it mode a lawn in nearly three
years a godsend. But it's the great advantage is that
I can just literally close the door and then go
and do what I need to do. I'm surrounded by
plenty of parks, you know, We've got great beaches nearby,
so there's plenty of public spaces that peoples. Yeah, that's
(31:17):
right exactly, you know, as you should. And in fact,
some of the other planning reforms that we've just announced
on the weekend was about encouraging more of that and
being able to do more outdoor dining me able to
do so. There was a weird some weird rules around
outdoor dining in that you could have outdoor dining in
any area. This was across New South Wales. But if
(31:40):
your development approval said you could only have one hundred
people a one hundred patrons in your restaurant or your
bar or whatever it may be, then no matter even
if you had space for one hundred and twenty with
your outdoor dining, you couldn't expand it. So we've removed
that restriction so that you can have a reasonable increase
in the number of patrons you can have. We've also
(32:01):
made it easier for cultural events in public parks to
set up, so you don't need to go through a
full DA process to get that going. And for weirdly
enough to have cafes and bookshops and other non licensed
venues open during special events right so they didn't have
extended the capacity to have extended trading hours during special events.
(32:23):
You could do it for a license venue. It was
very easy or relatively easy to do through the liquor
and gaming laws. But if you are at the cafe
next door to a small bar that could open extend
trading longer, you'd have to close. So again that's a
bit crazy.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
And who would be policing that? Is that a council
thing to they.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
Play yeah, so this would need a resolution of council
to say, hey, there's this special event going on. It
might be a country fair, it might be something active
in a town center. The Woollongong's hosting the World Triathlon
Championships in a couple of weeks time, so that might
be classed as a special event, and say hey, we
shouldn't have shops closed if you want to open, if
you want ex and your trading hours, whether you're a
(33:01):
bookshop or a bar. We should be able to do
something where the without having ad without having to do
a DA, without having a modification to your development consent,
you know, to deal without having to go through all
of that red tape.
Speaker 1 (33:14):
So I mean, obviously one of the issues, not obviously,
but like demand on housing has a large relationship with
population growth, and the federala makes the decisions about population growth,
you guys, don't. I presume there's some consultation, but you know,
(33:35):
they're probably tell you what they're deciding to do. And
of course population tends to tends to go wherever the
jobs are, and the bigger economic centers like Sydney will
detract a lot of the population growth. And i'd imagine
you guys have in New South Wales coming here have
probably seen a lot of population growth over the last
four or five years in New South Wales, probably far
outstripping your what you had planned for.
Speaker 2 (33:57):
Yeah, so we we have a periodic updates of our
own population forecasts, so they're done on a five yearly basis,
which becomes what's known as a common planning assumption.
Speaker 1 (34:07):
So that's backwards looking or forfore's looking right.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
So and the really fancy term for saying, this is
what we think is going to be coming down the pipeline,
and this is where we think it's going to go.
So we look at trends of where people are moving
and the like, so that that way, that's for instance,
school infrastructure can look ahead and say, okay, we know
that there's expected this sort of population growth in an area.
(34:30):
They've got some very good and understanding of what that
means in terms of the mix of housing and how
many kids are likely to be in a particular area
as a result, and they say, right, this is where
we need to either expand an existing school at a
new school. Similarly, health does the same, transport does the same,
all based off those common assumptions which are all fed
(34:50):
in from both expectations of natural population growth as well
as migration.
Speaker 1 (34:56):
And do you think, how do you think if we
look back in the last since COVID, well since post COVID,
when we've got a big influx of new immigrants becoming
to Australia, live populosh growth accelerated. Do you think if
you give yourselves a market at ten, you've done well
in terms of what you were planning back then? Did
(35:16):
you get caught by surprise?
Speaker 2 (35:18):
And look, I think COVID caught everyone by surprise, both
in terms of the number of people who left Australia
as a result, because there was a lot of people
who went home, a lot of international students and like
a lot of people who obviously were worried about their
family and any relatives they might have overseas, they went home.
A lot of the influx post COVID has been a
(35:40):
lot of that returning. Now there has been some additional
stuff because we generally do need We've got some labor
market challenges that we need to deal with, so our
construction workforce needs skilled migrants. We need it in the
care economy and the like, and the return of international
students has helped not only with the hospitality sector but
(36:02):
also with our biggest services export in New South Wales.
You know, international education is our biggest export. Now people
don't think or hang on, how is people coming here
to learn and export is because that's that's the way
trade we're selling to overseas.
Speaker 1 (36:16):
That's us in Federal Earth. Nationally it's our second largest.
Speaker 2 (36:19):
Yeah, that's right, that's right, that's huge, it's huge, and
it's something that's great because everyone who comes and has
a good experience with the education sector and living in
Australia go back as ambassadors to say Australia's fantastic, Sydney's fantastic,
Woollongong and Newcastle are fantastic. And that's that's how we
increase global trade through those personal personal relationships as well
(36:41):
through the d time.
Speaker 1 (36:42):
What are some of the big big things that you
guys and your minister ministerial portfolio working on at the moment, Like,
you know, what's something that's really taking a lot of
your time. Yeah, fort's maybe just look at housing and
public spaces.
Speaker 2 (36:59):
So in the last sitting week of Parliaments a week
or so ago, I introduced landmark legislation to reform the
planning system in New South Wales to make it easier
to change the system, to change the system. So so
planners had become slaves to process, right.
Speaker 1 (37:16):
And that's we're now we're talking about governments planners.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
No, this is this is planners, generally plans. It could
be council planners, could be government state government planners become
slaves to process because well over a period of time. Okay,
I bought a section from the Act just to because
I thought this might be an illustrated point. So if
someone has to consider a development application, these are the
(37:44):
things that they need to look at the in considering
the matter's relevance to the development subject. Development application, the
provision of any environmental planning instrument. Now there's there's thousands
of potential regulations in there, and any proposed instrument that
is or has been the subject of public consultation right,
(38:06):
and any development control plan at a local level, and
any planning agreement that has been entered into or draft
planning agreement that a developer has offered under Section seven
point four of the Act. That's one part. And the
regulations that apply to the land on which the development
application relates. Then there's part B that says the likely
(38:30):
impacts of that development, including environmental impacts on both the
natural and build environments, and the social and economic impacts
in the locality. Then you go to C the suitability
of the site for development. Then you go to D
any submissions made in accordance with this act or regulation.
Then finally eve the public interest.
Speaker 1 (38:50):
And what does that mean? Interest? That mean anything?
Speaker 2 (38:52):
Right, it does, and that's the challenge, right, So planners
have been subject to looking at everything in that light. Now,
ninety percent of developed applications in New South Wales for
a million dollars or less medium house price one point
five to two million, right, so much less than the
price of a typical home or the medium price of
a home. But what that's meant is that there's a
(39:15):
risk aversion in the way that planners have to go
about things because any of those if they don't do
that completely, could be subject to legal challenge. So there's
the reason why, the reason why slowed up getting stuck.
It's funny where you're sitting right now.
Speaker 1 (39:29):
This building on this building and as a hotel was
sort of like a backpacker's place upstairs, which one of
my kids in a family runner, but we put a
DA in and I'll never do it again. It was
the most punishing post. It costs me a fortune. Then
it's consultants, you know, and I won't say which council
(39:51):
in the council kept saying, well, probably because of is
you have to give a consultant on that, and then
then you have to get a consultant something else. The
architects didn't cost that much, basically sixty rand or something,
but all the consultants there that costs another two hundred.
Speaker 2 (40:08):
Yeah, and that's the stuff that we're trying to So
what did you just introduce? So we introduced a reintroduce
what's known as proportionality as an object of the Planning Act.
Now that's a fancy way of saying, if something's really
really big and have a significant impact, stories even like
a mind like a resources proposal, if it's really big
(40:31):
likely to have significant impacts, that gets a really thorough
full assessment. Right, everyone gets input. If, however, it's a
car port, right, it shouldn't need to get the same
level of assessment as that same mind a risk risk
reintroducing a risk oriented system it.
Speaker 1 (40:50):
Sounds more practical. So what you're just basic saying is
that the council people who might be looking at it,
if it's a car port, you don't need to give
it the same amount of attention and core for all
the consultants. That's the amount of time that gets wasted
and money gets spent, by the way, because what ends
up happening is because I'll never do it again, and
I could turn this in a residential building, but like
it's just such a pain in the net. We didn't
(41:11):
get the approval as it turned out anyway, So after all,
I said, of a sudden, just let's keep running a hotel.
Speaker 2 (41:18):
Leave it the way. The aim is to try and
make the system once again outcome focused rather than process focus, right,
And that seems, you know, a simple expression of the desire,
But there's a lot of complexity to unwind in that,
and some cultural change as well in terms of attitude
andal change, which we can do, and I think there's
a there's a general push from society for us to
(41:42):
do that, and I hope that we're able to get
that piece of legislation through because of course we're in
minority government in both the Lower House and the Upper House.
Speaker 1 (41:50):
So mid Lie on the Greens.
Speaker 2 (41:52):
Look, I'll rely on I'm hoping because we've been working
with the opposition on this, right so, and I'm I'm
hoping that we can do this at a buypar I'm
hoping multipartisan because the challenge now has become so acute
when it comes to housing, when it comes to getting
through job creating developments, that we need to do something different.
(42:14):
We can't continue to do the same thing and expect
a miraculously different outcome. It just won't happen unless we
do some changes. So I'm hoping that the opposition have
been working with is discussing this for some time. I
hope that they come on board and support these changes.
I mean, there's a bunch of other changes in there
as well. There's a thing called we're proposing called the
(42:34):
Development Coordination Authority. Now, if you put in a DA
at the moment and you have to get an assessment
by a state government agency, you can go to one
of twenty two different parts of this stuff. Southwest, kid,
You're not twenty twenty two parts, right, Not everything goes
to that, but you can you can face up to
twenty two different.
Speaker 1 (42:54):
Agents twenty two parts of the comment, right, so.
Speaker 2 (42:57):
We want a single front door, right, So bring these
people together to work together and getting that because what's
happened in the past is that people will put to
completely conflicting conditions on a development approve. One agency will
say don't touch a leaf on a tree on that block.
The other agency you'll say, clear fell the lot. Now,
(43:17):
if you've got that approval, how on earth are you
supposed to sort that out? Yeah? Right, so we need
to get our own house in order in order to
tidy that up. So a single front door to the
state government, we work out and come up with a
single response, which could be yes, yes, with conditions or no,
depending on the circumstances. But it allows people to get
(43:40):
on with it with a lot more common sense.
Speaker 1 (43:42):
So they're bigger developments because if there's a smaller development,
it's got to get.
Speaker 2 (43:46):
Or it can be somewhere where it's in a bushfire
prone area. Right, So it's our council can has the
same challenge. So you'll submit something to a council, council
may need to come to one of those agencies within
state government to get that answer. We want to that
process easier for people.
Speaker 1 (44:01):
And when you're conceiving these ideas, do you. I'm always
curious about I'm actually super curious about how Daniel Mooky
might get involved, how Chris Men's might get involved. Is
it just left to Paul Scully in your team.
Speaker 2 (44:19):
You're yes on some of the detail. But look, the
Premier and I catch up weekly, and Daniel and I
catch up on a regular basis. All of my colleagues,
you know, we contact each other when we've got a
problem in our local areas to try and sort out.
So it's informed by all of that, informed by conversations
with industry, informed by conversations with my own department, informed
(44:44):
by conversations with the group that represents the planners, the
group that represents the architects, So all of these things
coming into it, as well as as bit you pick
up along the way and you look at other jurisdictions
to see what they might have done. The Development Coordination
Authority is modeled on something that Queensland does. We're going further,
(45:06):
but but that was the sort of looked at that
and I thought that makes sense. How could we apply
it in New South Wales.
Speaker 1 (45:11):
Because you mentioned earlier the Queensland seems to have a greater.
That's called product productivity in terms of housing at the
moment or dwellings. Would that have something to do with
the fact that Brisbane City Council controls such a large
I look at it, could less complex than less complex
than that?
Speaker 2 (45:30):
Yeah, yeah, that could be one element to it. It's
there in it. I look there. They've been able to
get things through their system a lot more quickly. You know,
our Planning Acts fifty years old. It's shown a bit
of wear and tear, but it's also overlaid with a
whole heap of court decisions and regulations and.
Speaker 1 (45:50):
The like that have an amendment after Men's I described
it as a bit like cholesterol, you know, so these things,
you know, individually I might eat a couple l meals
that are a bit borderline.
Speaker 2 (46:02):
In terms of their relatively their health Star rating, for instance,
and individually not a bad decision. Collectively, though over time
at blocks it comes up the arteries and the same
sort of thing has happened in New South Wales over
fifty years, that sort of stuff the Planning Act. There's
been around one hundred and twenty different attempts through the
New South Wales Parliament over that time. To change the
(46:24):
act right, some with success, some without, and so it
all adds up over time, and every now and again
you have to reset that and that's what we're trying
to do at the moment.
Speaker 1 (46:33):
So you're how do you feel like, how do you
feel that you're going to be able to do what
your predecessors haven't been able to do in terms of
this fifty year old Bruce's Acts, which has been amended
so many times it doesn't look like an accent anymore.
Speaker 2 (46:49):
Yeah, that is the challenge. Look, I think I think
there's a willingness in the government to absolutely get on
with this. We've made a priority because we recognize that
we can't keep going on doing the same thing and
expecting a different result. And part of it is just
a general desire. I mean, I don't want to answer
to my nieces and nephews and say, well, you were
in a position where you had an opportunity for me
(47:11):
to go to get a house and you you're stuffed
it up. That's pretty powerful motivator in and of it,
because why why is it that I've got the shot
at it? And and not But look, we're also doing
some non legislative things, something that might interest you in
your your thinkers, We've got this pre sale finance guarantee.
Speaker 1 (47:31):
I saw that. It's amazing. Did you offer to developers?
Speaker 2 (47:33):
Yeah, that's image.
Speaker 1 (47:34):
You can explain it, yecause I just think and I
did say something recently about it. I thought, I think
that's one of the I'm not going to explain what is.
I get you explain it is. But I have said
publicly that this is one of the most innovative thing.
Won't put up on your Instagram page, I'm sure who's
page put up, but one of the most innovative government
and creative government financing enhancements that I've ever seen anywhere
(47:57):
in the world.
Speaker 2 (47:58):
Yeah, it's explain. That's pretty cool. The economist in me
loves this one. But so, what what happens is a
developer goes out, gets an approval. You know, they might
have one hundred units that've they've got approval for, and
the commercial lenders and say, okay, off the plan. You've
got to sell eighty percent of them before the banks
off Off the back of that, You've got to sell
(48:20):
eighty percent pre cell before we give you the finance
to start construction. Correct, right, So someone will go out
to their marketing campaign. Over the first three months they
might sell fifty percent. Great, but then it really starts
to slow up. And that's fine. People were making a
big investment they wanted to send to want to see
it and the like. I understand that, but what it
means is delay. So it can mean years getting that.
Speaker 1 (48:42):
Those developers cannot lay one brick.
Speaker 2 (48:44):
They can do it until they get that's right. So
what we're doing is using the government's balance sheet as
a bridge to that commercial finance. So if you get
to fifty percent of your pre sales you can come
and ask the government to get you have to get
fifty percent, yep, yep. So you get to fifty percent,
you can come and apply to the government to go
(49:04):
as guaranteur effectively, effectively the same as you might do
for your kids for their mortgage.
Speaker 1 (49:09):
So they have Insuran rental guarantee.
Speaker 2 (49:11):
That's right exactly. This is the new South Wales government guarantee.
And we're saying, right, we're going to commit to buying
that difference to get in say that last thirty percent,
for instance, up to fifty million dollars worth of properties
to get you over the line to get your commercial
finance to get you started. You can keep selling those
properties that we've guaranteed while you're building, and then if
(49:35):
you sell them, the guarantee falls away and we can
use it on another place. If, however, we get to
the end you've built them all and you say hang on,
I'm going to call on the guarantee, the New South
Wales government will buy those at a discount and then
we can use them either for social housing, affordable housing,
market rental, or we can sell ourselves and get the
money back. We've put a commitment of up to a
(49:56):
billion dollars behind that. It's it's definitely nationally leading, if
not world leading in terms of the size of it.
I think world And we're hopeful that this will actually
mean construction could get started on a whole lot more
projects than what it could what it would have done,
and the time it would have taken to eke out
(50:18):
the pre sales to get to commercial finance.
Speaker 1 (50:20):
And I think consumers audiences don't realize the reason a
lot of times developers don't proceed is because that developers
don't have the money they usually put in.
Speaker 2 (50:32):
We've got around fifteen thousand dwellings at any given time
or at the moment, So it's come down a bit,
but fifteen thousand dwellings at the moment that are approved
but not commenced, and we believe this will make a
big difference. We've already had we opened up for expressions
of interest last week about a week ago. We've already
had twenty two expressions of interest so far, and we're
(50:54):
hoping to be able to write the first provide the
first guarantees by the end of the year.
Speaker 1 (50:58):
And just so I understand a bit more, is the
guarantee delivered to the bank, or that a guarantee goes
to the development to.
Speaker 2 (51:03):
The bank, to the bank. So this is the bridge
to commercial fight. So we're not providing any finance at all.
All we're providing is essentially a guarantee, a bit of
essentially a bit of paper to say that we are
willing to guarantee these these particular dwellings. But it's bridge
to commercial file. So you've got to stack up. You've
got to be able to stack up and get your
(51:24):
commercial is to be right, yeah, and you've got to
get underway quick smart right. So we want we want
to be able to churn this guarantee as much as possible.
We can only churn that by getting people started on construction.
Speaker 1 (51:35):
And I think that one of the things is important
here and this is I actually I'm I'm a big fan.
I'm a Daniel Mookie fan of how he's maintained our
balance sheet. Because you know, our rating, our global rating
of New South Wales, which is triple A, is really important.
And most people don't realize therefore that the budgets are
really important because rating agencies done like stupid budgets, and
(52:00):
because if the if you, if you continually dish that
up to rating agencies, eventually they will re rate you
and your your rating will go down from tripa A,
which is what we enjoy here in New South Wales,
to some other number. And as soon as they start
doing that, your position, your your one billion dollars that
you're going to put out there into the marketplace is
available for developers that starts to get it becomes a
(52:23):
liability and that becomes a bit of a drama for you.
Speaker 2 (52:25):
Yeah, we couldn't do this without the strength of our
balance triple A rating. Yeah, that's right, and if we
as You're right, you absolutely point out if we drop
that rating, our interest bill goes up totally right, and
when our interest bill goes up, even though we've done
a lot of work to get our debt position under control,
we inherited the highest level of debt of one incoming
(52:46):
New South that any New South Wales government has handed
to another government. We're getting that under control. But if
we don't, then our interest bill, where we could be
paying higher wages to people, or we could be doing
more things in the public spaces portfolio, we could be
doing a whole range of other things. We can't do
that because instead we're paying interest on debt.
Speaker 1 (53:07):
And this is the problem in America at the moment.
But people don't realize the debt burden or the interest
rate payment burden which comes out of taxes you absolutely
you have to take from people here in your South Wales,
and the same thing if applies at a federal level.
But the interest rate burden increases quite significantly with a
rerating from triple A to some other huge different because
(53:27):
triple A is the best rating to get in the world,
like even the United States doesn't have a triple A rating.
I'm not sure Victoria has been rerated.
Speaker 2 (53:35):
I think yeah, I'm not sure what they are at
the moment.
Speaker 1 (53:37):
Australia Triple A. And I don't think most people understand
the importance of the interaction between what you're doing, the
billion dollar guarantee to developers and what Moogie does the
Treasury making sure that he puts out budgets that are responsible,
you know, relative to how agencies external rating agencies see
how balance it look like. The relationship is quite ynamic,
(54:00):
really important. It is.
Speaker 2 (54:02):
It's why we catch up on a regular basis, bloody critical.
But to put it in context, when we came when
we were first elected in March twenty twenty three, the
interest we're paying on the debt at that time, which
we've been able to reduce was the equivalent of what
we spend annually on the police and TAFE combined. Wow. Right,
(54:24):
that was just going in interest moments that had to
get be brought under control. You just can't run a government.
You can't run a health system, you can't run a
police force, a fire as if fire education, So you
can't run that when you're having to shovel more money
out the door in paying off interest on debt.
Speaker 1 (54:43):
Esspayly someone a buying a house that can't afford to own,
and they've got a massive mortgage on it, and in
every month they're paying out more in their mortgage than
they've been able to pay it for their kids school
fees and everything else. And something's going to suffer.
Speaker 2 (54:54):
That's right. You can only put it on the credit
card for so long before all the chickens come home
to roost.
Speaker 1 (55:00):
That's very good. I mean, I'm actually I really do
like that policy. And what you're trying to do is,
by the way, other states probably should start trying to
copy this.
Speaker 2 (55:09):
We've had inquiries. Yeah, we've had inquiries I think every
treasury and every planning department in every other state of
contact at our chives. Have we set this up?
Speaker 1 (55:19):
Yeah, And you're saying you've had twenty two submissions so far,
but when do you think you roll out your first one?
Speaker 2 (55:25):
I hope to do that before the end of the year.
Speaker 1 (55:26):
Okay. And as you say, it's fifteen thousand pre approved
apartment buildings whatever it is dwellings available to be done,
which needs probably of those most of those we finance
a lot of very feel actually they find itself with
the balance their own balancehit. Unless it's Harry triggerab Off.
Speaker 2 (55:43):
That's right, there's a few who have they have a
capacity over years and years of business to be able
to build up that most people don't. And we're aiming
at the mid tier developers, the guys who are building
no more than two million dollar properties. Yeah, so you're
not trying to trying to do the luxury apartments or
anything like that. We're trying to get some volume out
(56:05):
and support some volume coming out so that more people
have got a chance to get to a million. Unless
I appreciate it, you know, just too minute.
Speaker 1 (56:13):
Well, Minister Scully, Minister for New South Wales, Minister for
Planning and Public Spaces, I really appreciate you coming in
today and explaining to us, probably not all the details
going on your portfolio, because your portfolio is quite complex
and covers a lot of stuff and we probably don't
have enough time to talk about everything you do. But
I really appreciate your time and I actually think some
(56:35):
of these issues that you've spoke about today, for me,
especially this government guarantee, state government guarantee for developers relative
to their pre sales obligations in order for them to
get the deal off the table and start to be built,
is one of the most innovative that I've ever seen
from a government. In fact, I'd say pretty ballsy.
Speaker 2 (56:55):
Yeah, it's not just innovative. Well, the history has always
been subsidy, and this is no subsidy. This is just
using the charge for that we do. We do charge it.
There's a credit for a line, but that recovers the cost.
Speaker 1 (57:08):
Of administering it, just like during the just just laying
the during the GFC, the federal government put up a
deposit guarantee four banks. They did, but they didn't charge them.
Now they do.
Speaker 2 (57:21):
They do charge them, but then we've set it up
so so that recovers the cost of administering That's exactly right.
So there are costs, we've got to recover those. But
you know, I think this is a really this is
something I've been wanting to introduce for it for a
long time. So I'm glad we were able to get
it over the line.
Speaker 1 (57:39):
Well done, Thank you, thanks very much, Thanks thanks for
having me on. Appreciate it.
Welcome to the Mentor. I'm Mark Boris Paul Scully. Welcome
to the Mentor.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Mate, thanks very much, thanks for having me on.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
And I hope you appreciate that I'm dressed in my
podcasting gear, but you're looking magnificent there in your ministerial outfit.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
I prefer to be dressed in the podcasting gear to
be honest with you, be more comfortable.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
And let's just establish it. So we're doing this the
couple of days before the Grand Final. I'm not sure
when we're going to go there with this show, but
doesn't matter. I need to know straight up. Who do
you go for in rugby league.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
I'm a Dragons fan, but as a boyfriend the Gong
recovering Steelers fan, I think is best.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
Just wow. Yeah, so you're Dragons and because of this.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Yeah, because of the merger. Yeah yeah, so after twenty
eight years, I should get over it and just move on.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
To sure s George's will warr anyway? Yeah, absolutely, see
you're from the Gong.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
I am born and raised, born and.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
Raised and by the way, Peter of Lentnesses too, Yes, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Cra High, where my dad went a few years before.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Peter though Okay, So tell me a little bit about
your background, because we're very rare to do our do
audiences get to anyone voters for them. It gets too
much about people's backgrounds when they're in Parliament especially, and
people actually believe not really interested in that stuff. So
tell me a little bit about the Scully family. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
So my mum moved here from post World War II
Germany when she was five, and my dad's families of
Irish descent. He was a truck driver his entire life.
Mum was a cleaner, and then they went on to
own their own small business at airport shuttle service that
they ran. But yeah, born and raised in the Gong
(01:43):
and my wife is the federal MP for that area.
So where one of those strange and rare couples that
are really lockstep in terms of our professional lives. Political family, Yeah,
full political family. Yeah so yeah, federal MP, State MP
one one house.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
When you said your mom and dad had a business
withsin airport shuttles, are you saying that they were shuttling
people from the ill warred district will Go and blah
blah blah to Sydney Airport.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Yep, absolutely yes, So they used to have a number.
I think they got to four at the end, twelve
seedar buses so people could drive them on a standard license,
and they do a few trips a day across those
to either the airport to drop people off to go
on holidays or business pick people up and take them
back home, or go to cruise ships as well.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
And your mum actually born in Germany.
Speaker 2 (02:35):
She was Yeah, she was born in Ninburg and emigrated
when she was five.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
Did Why did the family come to Australia.
Speaker 2 (02:44):
My grandfather's Latvian and my grandmother's German, And they decided
that post World War two Germany wasn't the place where
they'd have a good opportunity. So they had a couple
of options. So there was a line to go to
migrate to Canada and a line to migrate to Australia.
The line to migrate to Australia was a bit shorter,
(03:06):
so they jumped in that one and yeah, lo and
behold here we are. Mum ended up moving to Wollongong,
or to Mount Kembler, a small mining village outside of Wollongong,
in the early couple of years after she got there,
and hasn't hasn't left that village since.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
You know, it's interesting about that because I happen to
know someone who has exactly the same grandparent heritage Latvian
and German. And it's interesting fact, I presume the same
exists in your family. But during the war, prior to
the World War Two, the Russians always had eyes for
(03:49):
Latvia and Estonia and Lithuania, et cetera. And you know,
probably similar to the geopolitical conflict that's going on to
the moment in that part of the world. And Germany
befriended Latvian said listen, we'll protect it from the Russians.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Because it didn't work.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
What's going to happen? And and a lot of a
lot of and Germany went into latviin and it didn't
work out that well. And of course the war started
with Russia et cetera. But it didn't work at that well,
and poor or Laffey was sort of stuck in between
let's call it two enemies. And but a lot of
Latvian people, as as I understood it from the conversation
(04:26):
I have with this family, actually decided to marry German
soldiers and women will marry a German soldier and because
they felt like as though they would be the get
some sort of level of protection by doing that. And
then that a lot of them actually emigrated to Adelaide.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
Yeah, that's right. And they've got a strong, strong German
heredage in that and that's that's right. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
And then one one family who I can sort of
I don't mind naming, actually is the you might be
too young to remember, but the very famous family is
called the Spalvin's family. John Spalvins, who is a Latvian
but his mother end up remarrying because his father was
unfortunately killed but during the war, but his mother remarried
a German soldier and whose name was bloomin Tel's, which
(05:17):
as I understand, means blooming Valley in German. And they
emigrated to South Australia. And quite a number of these
individuals actually in the small businesses could be involved in
them wine industry or something like that, particularly in Adelaide,
and a great contributors to the Australian, to Australia in
terms of you know, effort, great contributors and more. I
(05:38):
look at you, I can see there's you got the
people maybe they're watching on the camera or your camera
number two. He's got striking blue eyes and you actually
I can see that the likeness from the northern Europe
and the people from Latvia. Germans we know a lot
more about, but Lafa we know a little about. But
amazingly well educated people unbelievable things like music. Music is
(06:03):
a huge part of their life. Huge and is your mum.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Is your mum still by the way they are, Yeah,
mum and dads still are so unfortunate with that, but yeah,
they instilled that in Mum particularly, you know, insisted that
I learned an instrument when I was younger, and I
ended up studying piano for thirteen years right through primary
school and high school, so you doing. I didn't do
(06:30):
it in the HC. No, I was a bit more boring.
I did economics and maths and physics and chemistry, so
very much not on the creative side of things in
that sense. But I kept up the music because it
was just a diversion from from other things that you
had to do. So I'd managed to squeeze all of
that together with a bit of work, part time work
as well.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
So I did the same thing I did music and
the h and and I don't do anymore, but only
because keep my mum happy. But my mum's irish, but
like kept I'm happy. But but one thing I've learned
about that, and maybe you just mentioned maths and economics,
one thing I learned is later on life is that
music at a young age, particularly piano, is very instructive
(07:13):
informative for young people to become good at maths.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Yeah, that was I think that was part of the
reason because I ended up doing it because I was
getting in trouble at primary school and year like year
two or something, I was at the principal's office more
than I was at my desk, and the principal said
it was a small school, Mount Kembler. I think by
the time I left in year six there were ninety
six kids enrolls. I was small, right, And the principal said, well,
(07:38):
he's bored, so give him something that's going to challenge him.
And my grandmother, for whatever reason, had a piano at
her place. It was the heaviest thing known to my
rights uprights cast iron inside you know, sixteen people made
sort of move it and that was that was how
piano was chosen. Because there was an instrument there because
(07:58):
mom and dad couldn't afford it anything else for us.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
So that's amazing. So, like I always, I find it fascinating.
Maybe other people don't, but I find it fascinating when
someone has that sort of sort of story. And what
do you as a kid, Well, if you remember back
as a kid and today you're a politician and you're
a minister, and when you are the minister for I'm
going to get us right now, planning planning in publics
(08:21):
and public spaces right And we'll talk about that in
a moment. But what do you think that that upbringing,
with that sort of background left you with in relation
to how you live your life as a as a
as a minister today.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
Yeah, I think the thing that was instilled in most
is work hard no matter what you do. And mom
and dad weren't ever worried about what myself or my
brother or my sister would end up doing in life.
It was just make sure you tried hard at school
to go as far as you could. I was the
first of my family to go to university.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
Where where do you sit in terms of brothers system?
Speaker 2 (08:58):
I'm the oldest, so that helped. But but you know,
so just try and get a good education, try and
make a good deal in life. And as dad said,
don't don't end up as a truck driver like he did.
He goes us too hard work, that is it.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
By the way, truck driving is hard. Yeah, was he
doing long haul driving?
Speaker 2 (09:18):
No, he was doing a lot around the steel works,
mainly and local stuff. But you know B doubles, you know,
from from sort of coal body trucks to B doubles.
There was enough work around the steel works at times
to keep him well and truly busy. But in order
to pay the mortgage and keep us fed and clothed
and everything, it meant double ships. So there wasn't too
(09:38):
many days of the week where Dad wasn't wasn't working
even though he was employed at the time by someone,
he wasn't an owner driver. But yeah, he still had
to work hard to keep the money coming in.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
Do you feel grateful to your parents? Just not so
much for what they told you, but for what you
saw them do extraordinarily, Like it's the mens, haven't I
don't want to. I'm not here to blow smoke up
anyone's you know what, But I have to say, like
you know, some liberal party people will get really upset
(10:10):
with me saying this, But I've been a big fan
of the Men's Government, and I mean I interviewed Daniel
your Treasurer movie recently, and I've obviously I've interviewed the
premiere before. The Men's Government seems to and Stephen, you know,
they go, you, your minister, what's Stephen? Minnesota?
Speaker 2 (10:28):
Minnesota jobs, tourism, a small business, small business.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
And it seems to me that all of you guys
down to worth come from normal families, hard working families,
have got really good values pretty much not left, not right.
You're sort of sitting in the middle somewhere, and you
(10:53):
get it like it's just I mean, I don't know,
you know, it literally is my first conversation with you.
But I'm getting that sent straight up.
Speaker 2 (11:00):
There's there's there's not no airs and graces on some
of us, like we all came most of us came
through public education system, have have lived in our communities
for a long time, so seen the good and the bad,
and genuinely there to to try and make a difference
to those people, to make that make it easier for
the next generation coming through, you know, and that shuld
(11:22):
that's sort of always been the Australian social contract, you know,
is that everyone should be there and if they can
use their position to make to raise the standard of living,
make it easier for those who are coming through after you.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
So we are going to talk about the standard living
and how New South Wales government, you know, the men's
government at the moment, and in particularly your contribution, how
you direct yourself towards raising the stand living because I
think just as a punter, I think and I'm lucky
my stand living is a certain level because I've had
some lack of my life, But most Australians have been
(11:58):
going backwards by most measures on standard living. And let's
just talk about New South Wales. I'm probably more so
the case in New South well because we're the biggest,
most populous stable maybe, but it doesn't matter. We you know,
we have we got people here who are they're stand
living sound backwards and it relates to housing and relates
to everything and you know, jobs and what opportunities, and
(12:21):
I do want to talk to about that because I
think that is the most important fundamental value that governments
need to governm for, apart from safety and make sure
we're enough water and we've got the roads or all
that sort of stuff, but just my standard of living,
you know, how I live my life. Can I afford
to live in this house? Can I afford them mortgage
(12:42):
like your dad and mum always trying to make sure
of Can I afford the rent if you're just renting?
Can I afford to send my kids to soccer and
or maybe get my daughters taught another or musical instrument.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
And as we live longer, can we afford our retirements?
Speaker 1 (12:58):
That is the critical one.
Speaker 2 (13:00):
And this is all of the tensions that are playing
themselves out. And while it doesn't sound like the immediate
portfolio that would have a great deal of influence on it,
planning does. That's because it's about how we most efficiently
use our land to advance the economic, social, and environmental
(13:21):
needs of the state for the future. For the future.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
Absolutely, I'm really glad to raise that we're living longer
thing because I met I had John Howard here last
this week actually, and I was talking to about a
variety of things. We're talking about some of the great
policies of previous governments, and we hit on poor Keating's
(13:44):
compulsory super innovation or the super innovation Guarantee for employees,
which is one of the great on a global basis.
It's one of the great policies ever been put into place,
and not only just to make sure that you know,
individuals employees, one day we'll have some money retire, but
on the flip side, taking the burden away from government
having to provide from when they do retire, because most
(14:05):
countries in the world they're broke if you look at
the liability they have Japan.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
Japan is a real challenge with an aging population, and
we've got a similarly aging population, but we've been able
to cater for elephant elements of it by making the
big calls some time ago. That allows them to go through.
It allows compound interest. What is it the eighth grade
wonder of the world. I said, it's there's time needed
(14:34):
for that to really take effect. So by the Hawk
and Keyting governments making those calls in conjunction with the
labor movement at the time through the accord process, that
allowed a lot of people who would have relied only
and solely on the pension to set themselves up for life,
(14:55):
for a comfortable retirement, and my parents among them. They've
been able to turn their hard work through their business
in the end primarily into something that set them up comfortably.
And they're not wealthy by any way, shape or form,
but they're comfortable. If you're comfortably will that's right exactly.
(15:15):
And they know that they can go about their life
and not have to think terribly much about what they do.
They're not got extravagance lives, but they've got a life
that they know that they'll be able to feed themselves.
If they get sick, they'll be able to pay for
any doctors or anything like that, they'll be able to
get around and if they need it in time hopefully,
(15:36):
but if they need it in time, they'll be able
to get some help in at home. And that sort
of time they've exactly and they don't have to then
worry about calling on the rest of the family to
try and do that, particularly as they're raising their own kids.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
So that's social contract it is that they've now enjoyed
that they got from previous governments. Whether a liberal labor
it doesn't really matter to me. To me, that's gold
for those individually your parents. We are now have a
whole cohort of younger people who I recently I've actually
(16:12):
engaged in an actually to do this work for me
to say, if a young person lives beyond eighty one,
which is the age of Australia male eighty two for
female thereabouts, if they live to ninety one, but they're
only putting enough money away under the current actually.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
Where calculations when would they run out?
Speaker 1 (16:32):
Correct? So they either got to work longer post sixty
five with the assumes you leave the sixty five assumes
you make a certain amount per annum on the contributions
at nine, ten, eleven two percent. However it has been so,
but the assumption is also they're going to spend it
all and die at eighty one.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
There also assumes that you're secure in your housing. And
you got that was the other paint was part of it, right.
The assumption was for the vast majority of people, they'd
get to the point of retirement where they own their
own correct, and we're only doing maintenance to keep it going.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
And now we've got these things.
Speaker 2 (17:04):
Now we've got a big challenge with that, and that's
what's eroding some fundamental.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
So do you guys talk with this? Do you guys?
When I see you guys, you you know the senior
people are in parliament, sit arounds in your parliament, state parliament,
and you said the last state government. Do you sit
around and say, well, I mean I loved enough. This
conversation gets had. You know, we've got to play our
part in the national game. But it's really federal government
can't do much about any this anyways. Mostly state governments
(17:29):
do it anyway, and or counsels. Do you sit around say,
you know, my kids, your kids, maybe they won't have
the same outcome as you and or your parents will have.
When your kids are sixty five seventy seventy five, they
might not own their own home because they might ever
be able to afford to get one one two, They
(17:51):
may not have enough superheros because the medical health technology
are going to make them live longer anyway, even though
they don't want it. It's going to make them live longer.
But they won't live the life that your mum and
dad live. You just said your mom and didn't have
the same as my mom, and they had the luxury
of having an annual holiday and it's just a balanous nothing.
(18:13):
Fancy owning their own car and maybe able to get
a new cavery five years, not having to pay the
mortgage obs so they've got security of their own home,
being able to leave something to the kids, because that's
the big thing in their lives, leave them for the kids,
and be able to go to the hospital if they
need to go the doctor, they need to get transport off,
they need to and put reasonable food on the table.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
Well, we do we talk about that in the context
of the challenges we've got to face.
Speaker 1 (18:41):
Right, So actual conversational versations.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
Maybe it might be one on one or small groups
or the like, but it's trying to work through some
of those challenges. So and the big one that we've
been working through that directly is in my portfolio responsibilities,
or at least it has a big contribution to it.
How do we build more homes in New South Wales,
How do we make sure that New South Wales is
attracting international investment to create help create jobs, and how
(19:08):
do we make sure that the economy is working as
best it can when it comes to balancing up the
varying needs of conflicting land use opportunities throughout not only
Sydney but throughout the entire state. And that's the essence
of the planning portfolio.
Speaker 1 (19:26):
So, Paul, if you don't mind, forgot, just let's look
at housing for example, dwellings necessarily talking about houses, but anytime.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
We do it it's a roof ovor someone's hand exactly.
Speaker 1 (19:36):
Yeah, And I think you know the old system, you know,
we all greats train dream is to have a house.
But these days I think younger people have different views
on it, and younger people have a different sort of
interaction with societally. I mean a lot of them. Let's
just like to join up and go on holidays Gold
Coast or whatever they want to do. Where does your
(19:57):
portfolio fit into that part? Just Housing South Wales contribution
to the one point two million houses over what it
was announce SLEPT I think two.
Speaker 2 (20:07):
Years ago yep. So over the five years to mid
twenty twenty nine, New South Wales's contribution is three hundred
and seventy thousand, seventy seven thousand new homes in total.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
And we've already had a year a year yep. How
far where are you at?
Speaker 2 (20:23):
We're further behind than what we'd like. When we were elected,
the forecast for that five year period was one hundred
and a year no total to five years one hundred
and eighty thousand, was it? So we're trying to crank
it up.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
That was your forecast?
Speaker 2 (20:37):
That was yeah, that was what we got. When you
become a minister, they give you the thing known as
the Incoming Government Minister's Brief, and you looked at that
and one of the first glaring statistics I saw there
is the forecast for home building in New South Wales
over the next five years is one hundred and eighty
thousand homes. Now we've got a target of three hundred
and seventy seven thousand homes. That's a big gap we
had to close. And part of that is because we
(21:00):
simply haven't been building enough over a long period of time.
So over the last couple of decades we've been building
six homes per thousand people, and what per thousand people
in New South Wales so yeah, yeah a year and
Victoria and Queensland have been building eight and nine per thousand.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
The building more.
Speaker 2 (21:20):
Yeah, And then you overlay that with another challenge of
an aging population, because the proportion of single person households
is going to grow to roughly the same size as
the proportion of two adults two kids. But each and
each change each decimal place change in the average number
(21:40):
of people in a house in New South Wales in
Australia rather adds about one hundred and six one hundred
and the need for one hundred and sixty thousand new
dwellings in total. Well, right, so that's a big dynamic
and a big change in and of itself. Overlay that
with the fact that Sydney has become the second least
(22:01):
at least affordable city on the planet. Beaten on the planet,
we're only beaten by Hong Kong. That's not good. And
we're the eight hundred and fifty ninth least dense city
on the planet. Now those two things are related, all right,
So not building enough home least densely, so we've got
less density in fact as it was a bizar eight
(22:21):
hundred and fifty ninth break. Yeah, we're not ranking high there,
all right, we should.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
That's sort of good.
Speaker 2 (22:27):
Well, yes, yes, yeah, yes, and no, it just means
we've spread out right a lot. Now, Sydney, that's fine,
but where you start to run into problems. You've got
a National park at the north and at the south
and at the west and then in the northeast. Sorry,
northwest you've got one of the largest un mitigated floodplains
(22:49):
in the country, so yeah, and in the Southwest you've
got some challenges of fire, bushfire and some flood affectation
as well. So it's only so much Sydney can physically grow.
So that's why we have to increase the amount of
density we do. And it's also changing the way that
(23:09):
reflects how people like, a changing preference and the way
people live. An interesting stat that the government architect gave
me in a very early briefing. She said to me,
did I know that we've got less diversity in our
housing types today than what we did in the early
nineteen hundred?
Speaker 1 (23:24):
What does that mean?
Speaker 2 (23:26):
We either have really tall buildings or single dwellings and
not much in between. So the terraces and the townhouses
and the dual occupancies that have been around you see
them around the place. A lot of those in various
parts of Sydney were effectively banned because of rules in
the planning system. It was bizarre. So in state planning, yeah,
(23:47):
local government, but in local government these often were So
it was a bizarre situation where you know, the terraces
of Surrey Hills and those sort of areas that have
been subject a huge protest in the past to protect
them and keep them. You couldn't build that type of
home in most of Sydney anymore. Not only could you
(24:08):
not build it, you weren't even able to put in
a planning proposal for it. Why not just the rules
said no, we're not we're not allowing this housing type anymore,
which is just crazy. Right. Similarly, there'd be blocks that
were zoned to take a medium density, so a small
residential apartment four to six stories, and then they'd say, oh,
you can do a small residential apartment there, but your
(24:30):
limits nine meters in height, so of course that's only
two stories, so it just doesn't work right. So these
are the crazy things we had to unpick and start
to unpick, which is which is what we've been doing
over the last couple of years. And then there's some
other reforms that we've introduced to I've introduced last in
the last sitting week to the Parliament.
Speaker 1 (24:49):
So maybe you can explain a few things to me,
like so in terms of what you can build somewhere exactly,
maybe you get explaned how state government rules or planning
rules are overlay for local planning rules.
Speaker 2 (25:09):
So basically the state government system, the Environmental Planning and
Assessment Act, been around since nineteen seventy nine, changed a
lot over that period, but that's when it was first
put in place. That has set out some rules, that's
the enabling piece of legislation, and then councils set up
their own strategic planning for their particular council area and
(25:29):
that's we work out what the rules are in a
particular area. And what's happened is over time, whether as
a result of community activism, political advantage, that someone perceived
that some of those things have been really tightened in
terms of what you can build in much of not
only Sydney but New South Wales. In order to make
(25:52):
sure that we do have a good mix of housing
types for people, we've got to relax some of those things.
That's what we've been progressingly doing over the last couple
of years. There was a thing called the missing middle right,
which basically says that there's a middle in between really
really high and single dwelling in density. Yeah, in density right,
so this is your townhouses, your terraces, your dual lock
have been sees those sort of things, and a lot
(26:13):
of that you couldn't build, right, So we've had to
refer to all yes, because you weren't. You weren't the
planning rules wouldn't allow you to submit applications for those
sort of homes in a lot of areas. So we've
reduced that, removed that restriction in one hundred and seventy
one locations across and between the Hunter and the Yellow
(26:34):
Warra so far saying castle to Mountain to Wollongong yep
and saying that you can build these sort of things
in these areas that are close to either transport or
town centers and the like.
Speaker 1 (26:46):
So that's in one hundred and seventy Is that at
like one hundred and seventy railway stations.
Speaker 2 (26:50):
Yeah, railway stations or town centers or so for instance
that it might be coralmel In my own areas one
there's both a railway center and a town center. So
you can, you know, you can change the types of
dwellings you can put in there to allow additional density,
get people it back in to those areas and allow
people to get into a home.
Speaker 1 (27:12):
Is this the rule that I read about that said
in order to get to get that allowance. It was
sort of limited to eight hundred meters from a railway station.
Speaker 2 (27:24):
So this one is within the eight hundred meters.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
So if someone's got to a house for eight hundred
meters within a railway station, if it's one of those
ones that you've put under, I guess this comes under
some relations. Yeah, low and mid rise, and then one
of those people of two people get together, like in
next door, maybe you can maybe put in an application
(27:46):
to pull it down and build correct du like or
three stories or something exactly exactly, and suddenly a small
house on a large block for one family could become
homes for multiple families. When you do that, and when
you guys have to push that through parliament, I guess
you have to get through them both.
Speaker 2 (28:06):
Or this one was largely regular tree so that change.
We didn't have to run the gauntlet of Macquarie Street
on this one, but some other stuff that's doing that.
But yeah, you just change regulations, which sounds simple, but
it's got a you know, it's not often not always welcome.
Speaker 1 (28:21):
What are the political considerations though when you do that?
Like so I saw I remember when the premiere announced
it got a lot of pushback in the media like
a big time who wore the people opposed to it?
Why would they be posed?
Speaker 2 (28:36):
Well, bizarrely enough, they're often longer term residents of a
particular area who don't want to see their streets and
suburbs change.
Speaker 1 (28:43):
They don't want to change.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
No, they don't want to change. Change is hard. Changes
can be confronting. The change shouldn't be scary, but you
know you'll get various pushbacks. And this because often it's
those who are already in an area have a loud
voice as opposed to those who may want to live
in an area in the future, whose voices often aren't
found in this sort of in these sort of debates,
(29:06):
in these public discussions. So because you know, if someone's
living in a rental property at the moment, they don't
know where they might end up in the future. They
don't know what the community is that they might want
to end up in, so their voices sometimes not heard.
So I have to be part of that voice. It
wasn't so much a political consideration, it was more a
capacity consideration. So it was looking at where can you
(29:29):
get enough you know, where is there a full line
supermarket nearby that you can get all your groceries that
you need to live. Is there public transport available, whether
it be train, metro, light rail or bus. Is there
water and sewer capacity in that particular area, Because if
there's water and sewer capacity, it means that Sydney Water
(29:50):
or Hunter Water in the Hunter doesn't have to make
big investments in order to facilitate growth there, which means
that overall it's cheaper societally new infrastructure. Yeah, that's right.
So if you don't have to go investing in that.
The Productivity Commissioner worked out between a site in a
green field area and an infield area the difference could
(30:10):
be as much as seventy five thousand dollars dwelling.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
Right, So it's a huge difference and where it's also
where people want to live. You know, people do want
to live differently. Now we're not saying you do only infield.
There's still some green field activity going on because people
do want to live in that. But what we're saying
is we've got to rebalance things in Sydney, particularly around
where there's been the big transport investments, the big investments
(30:34):
in metros. You know, you shouldn't nowhere in the world
would you walk out of a multi billion dollar metro
transport system and look across the road and there's a
couple of Californian single story bungalows with a pool in
the backyard. It just doesn't happen, right, And that's the
growth of Sydney as a global city. That's the changing
expectation of people who now want to live there. I'm
(30:55):
an apartment dweller, right, so I live in an apartment in
central Wollongong. Love it mode a lawn in nearly three
years a godsend. But it's the great advantage is that
I can just literally close the door and then go
and do what I need to do. I'm surrounded by
plenty of parks, you know, We've got great beaches nearby,
so there's plenty of public spaces that peoples. Yeah, that's
(31:17):
right exactly, you know, as you should. And in fact,
some of the other planning reforms that we've just announced
on the weekend was about encouraging more of that and
being able to do more outdoor dining me able to
do so. There was a weird some weird rules around
outdoor dining in that you could have outdoor dining in
any area. This was across New South Wales. But if
(31:40):
your development approval said you could only have one hundred
people a one hundred patrons in your restaurant or your
bar or whatever it may be, then no matter even
if you had space for one hundred and twenty with
your outdoor dining, you couldn't expand it. So we've removed
that restriction so that you can have a reasonable increase
in the number of patrons you can have. We've also
(32:01):
made it easier for cultural events in public parks to
set up, so you don't need to go through a
full DA process to get that going. And for weirdly
enough to have cafes and bookshops and other non licensed
venues open during special events right so they didn't have
extended the capacity to have extended trading hours during special events.
(32:23):
You could do it for a license venue. It was
very easy or relatively easy to do through the liquor
and gaming laws. But if you are at the cafe
next door to a small bar that could open extend
trading longer, you'd have to close. So again that's a
bit crazy.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
And who would be policing that? Is that a council
thing to they.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
Play yeah, so this would need a resolution of council
to say, hey, there's this special event going on. It
might be a country fair, it might be something active
in a town center. The Woollongong's hosting the World Triathlon
Championships in a couple of weeks time, so that might
be classed as a special event, and say hey, we
shouldn't have shops closed if you want to open, if
you want ex and your trading hours, whether you're a
(33:01):
bookshop or a bar. We should be able to do
something where the without having ad without having to do
a DA, without having a modification to your development consent,
you know, to deal without having to go through all
of that red tape.
Speaker 1 (33:14):
So I mean, obviously one of the issues, not obviously,
but like demand on housing has a large relationship with
population growth, and the federala makes the decisions about population growth,
you guys, don't. I presume there's some consultation, but you know,
(33:35):
they're probably tell you what they're deciding to do. And
of course population tends to tends to go wherever the
jobs are, and the bigger economic centers like Sydney will
detract a lot of the population growth. And i'd imagine
you guys have in New South Wales coming here have
probably seen a lot of population growth over the last
four or five years in New South Wales, probably far
outstripping your what you had planned for.
Speaker 2 (33:57):
Yeah, so we we have a periodic updates of our
own population forecasts, so they're done on a five yearly basis,
which becomes what's known as a common planning assumption.
Speaker 1 (34:07):
So that's backwards looking or forfore's looking right.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
So and the really fancy term for saying, this is
what we think is going to be coming down the pipeline,
and this is where we think it's going to go.
So we look at trends of where people are moving
and the like, so that that way, that's for instance,
school infrastructure can look ahead and say, okay, we know
that there's expected this sort of population growth in an area.
(34:30):
They've got some very good and understanding of what that
means in terms of the mix of housing and how
many kids are likely to be in a particular area
as a result, and they say, right, this is where
we need to either expand an existing school at a
new school. Similarly, health does the same, transport does the same,
all based off those common assumptions which are all fed
(34:50):
in from both expectations of natural population growth as well
as migration.
Speaker 1 (34:56):
And do you think, how do you think if we
look back in the last since COVID, well since post COVID,
when we've got a big influx of new immigrants becoming
to Australia, live populosh growth accelerated. Do you think if
you give yourselves a market at ten, you've done well
in terms of what you were planning back then? Did
(35:16):
you get caught by surprise?
Speaker 2 (35:18):
And look, I think COVID caught everyone by surprise, both
in terms of the number of people who left Australia
as a result, because there was a lot of people
who went home, a lot of international students and like
a lot of people who obviously were worried about their
family and any relatives they might have overseas, they went home.
A lot of the influx post COVID has been a
(35:40):
lot of that returning. Now there has been some additional
stuff because we generally do need We've got some labor
market challenges that we need to deal with, so our
construction workforce needs skilled migrants. We need it in the
care economy and the like, and the return of international
students has helped not only with the hospitality sector but
(36:02):
also with our biggest services export in New South Wales.
You know, international education is our biggest export. Now people
don't think or hang on, how is people coming here
to learn and export is because that's that's the way
trade we're selling to overseas.
Speaker 1 (36:16):
That's us in Federal Earth. Nationally it's our second largest.
Speaker 2 (36:19):
Yeah, that's right, that's right, that's huge, it's huge, and
it's something that's great because everyone who comes and has
a good experience with the education sector and living in
Australia go back as ambassadors to say Australia's fantastic, Sydney's fantastic,
Woollongong and Newcastle are fantastic. And that's that's how we
increase global trade through those personal personal relationships as well
(36:41):
through the d time.
Speaker 1 (36:42):
What are some of the big big things that you
guys and your minister ministerial portfolio working on at the moment, Like,
you know, what's something that's really taking a lot of
your time. Yeah, fort's maybe just look at housing and
public spaces.
Speaker 2 (36:59):
So in the last sitting week of Parliaments a week
or so ago, I introduced landmark legislation to reform the
planning system in New South Wales to make it easier
to change the system, to change the system. So so
planners had become slaves to process, right.
Speaker 1 (37:16):
And that's we're now we're talking about governments planners.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
No, this is this is planners, generally plans. It could
be council planners, could be government state government planners become
slaves to process because well over a period of time. Okay,
I bought a section from the Act just to because
I thought this might be an illustrated point. So if
someone has to consider a development application, these are the
(37:44):
things that they need to look at the in considering
the matter's relevance to the development subject. Development application, the
provision of any environmental planning instrument. Now there's there's thousands
of potential regulations in there, and any proposed instrument that
is or has been the subject of public consultation right,
(38:06):
and any development control plan at a local level, and
any planning agreement that has been entered into or draft
planning agreement that a developer has offered under Section seven
point four of the Act. That's one part. And the
regulations that apply to the land on which the development
application relates. Then there's part B that says the likely
(38:30):
impacts of that development, including environmental impacts on both the
natural and build environments, and the social and economic impacts
in the locality. Then you go to C the suitability
of the site for development. Then you go to D
any submissions made in accordance with this act or regulation.
Then finally eve the public interest.
Speaker 1 (38:50):
And what does that mean? Interest? That mean anything?
Speaker 2 (38:52):
Right, it does, and that's the challenge, right, So planners
have been subject to looking at everything in that light. Now,
ninety percent of developed applications in New South Wales for
a million dollars or less medium house price one point
five to two million, right, so much less than the
price of a typical home or the medium price of
a home. But what that's meant is that there's a
(39:15):
risk aversion in the way that planners have to go
about things because any of those if they don't do
that completely, could be subject to legal challenge. So there's
the reason why, the reason why slowed up getting stuck.
It's funny where you're sitting right now.
Speaker 1 (39:29):
This building on this building and as a hotel was
sort of like a backpacker's place upstairs, which one of
my kids in a family runner, but we put a
DA in and I'll never do it again. It was
the most punishing post. It costs me a fortune. Then
it's consultants, you know, and I won't say which council
(39:51):
in the council kept saying, well, probably because of is
you have to give a consultant on that, and then
then you have to get a consultant something else. The
architects didn't cost that much, basically sixty rand or something,
but all the consultants there that costs another two hundred.
Speaker 2 (40:08):
Yeah, and that's the stuff that we're trying to So
what did you just introduce? So we introduced a reintroduce
what's known as proportionality as an object of the Planning Act.
Now that's a fancy way of saying, if something's really
really big and have a significant impact, stories even like
a mind like a resources proposal, if it's really big
(40:31):
likely to have significant impacts, that gets a really thorough
full assessment. Right, everyone gets input. If, however, it's a
car port, right, it shouldn't need to get the same
level of assessment as that same mind a risk risk
reintroducing a risk oriented system it.
Speaker 1 (40:50):
Sounds more practical. So what you're just basic saying is
that the council people who might be looking at it,
if it's a car port, you don't need to give
it the same amount of attention and core for all
the consultants. That's the amount of time that gets wasted
and money gets spent, by the way, because what ends
up happening is because I'll never do it again, and
I could turn this in a residential building, but like
it's just such a pain in the net. We didn't
(41:11):
get the approval as it turned out anyway, So after all,
I said, of a sudden, just let's keep running a hotel.
Speaker 2 (41:18):
Leave it the way. The aim is to try and
make the system once again outcome focused rather than process focus, right,
And that seems, you know, a simple expression of the desire,
But there's a lot of complexity to unwind in that,
and some cultural change as well in terms of attitude
andal change, which we can do, and I think there's
a there's a general push from society for us to
(41:42):
do that, and I hope that we're able to get
that piece of legislation through because of course we're in
minority government in both the Lower House and the Upper House.
Speaker 1 (41:50):
So mid Lie on the Greens.
Speaker 2 (41:52):
Look, I'll rely on I'm hoping because we've been working
with the opposition on this, right so, and I'm I'm
hoping that we can do this at a buypar I'm
hoping multipartisan because the challenge now has become so acute
when it comes to housing, when it comes to getting
through job creating developments, that we need to do something different.
(42:14):
We can't continue to do the same thing and expect
a miraculously different outcome. It just won't happen unless we
do some changes. So I'm hoping that the opposition have
been working with is discussing this for some time. I
hope that they come on board and support these changes.
I mean, there's a bunch of other changes in there
as well. There's a thing called we're proposing called the
(42:34):
Development Coordination Authority. Now, if you put in a DA
at the moment and you have to get an assessment
by a state government agency, you can go to one
of twenty two different parts of this stuff. Southwest, kid,
You're not twenty twenty two parts, right, Not everything goes
to that, but you can you can face up to
twenty two different.
Speaker 1 (42:54):
Agents twenty two parts of the comment, right, so.
Speaker 2 (42:57):
We want a single front door, right, So bring these
people together to work together and getting that because what's
happened in the past is that people will put to
completely conflicting conditions on a development approve. One agency will
say don't touch a leaf on a tree on that block.
The other agency you'll say, clear fell the lot. Now,
(43:17):
if you've got that approval, how on earth are you
supposed to sort that out? Yeah? Right, so we need
to get our own house in order in order to
tidy that up. So a single front door to the
state government, we work out and come up with a
single response, which could be yes, yes, with conditions or no,
depending on the circumstances. But it allows people to get
(43:40):
on with it with a lot more common sense.
Speaker 1 (43:42):
So they're bigger developments because if there's a smaller development,
it's got to get.
Speaker 2 (43:46):
Or it can be somewhere where it's in a bushfire
prone area. Right, So it's our council can has the
same challenge. So you'll submit something to a council, council
may need to come to one of those agencies within
state government to get that answer. We want to that
process easier for people.
Speaker 1 (44:01):
And when you're conceiving these ideas, do you. I'm always
curious about I'm actually super curious about how Daniel Mooky
might get involved, how Chris Men's might get involved. Is
it just left to Paul Scully in your team.
Speaker 2 (44:19):
You're yes on some of the detail. But look, the
Premier and I catch up weekly, and Daniel and I
catch up on a regular basis. All of my colleagues,
you know, we contact each other when we've got a
problem in our local areas to try and sort out.
So it's informed by all of that, informed by conversations
with industry, informed by conversations with my own department, informed
(44:44):
by conversations with the group that represents the planners, the
group that represents the architects, So all of these things
coming into it, as well as as bit you pick
up along the way and you look at other jurisdictions
to see what they might have done. The Development Coordination
Authority is modeled on something that Queensland does. We're going further,
(45:06):
but but that was the sort of looked at that
and I thought that makes sense. How could we apply
it in New South Wales.
Speaker 1 (45:11):
Because you mentioned earlier the Queensland seems to have a greater.
That's called product productivity in terms of housing at the
moment or dwellings. Would that have something to do with
the fact that Brisbane City Council controls such a large
I look at it, could less complex than less complex
than that?
Speaker 2 (45:30):
Yeah, yeah, that could be one element to it. It's
there in it. I look there. They've been able to
get things through their system a lot more quickly. You know,
our Planning Acts fifty years old. It's shown a bit
of wear and tear, but it's also overlaid with a
whole heap of court decisions and regulations and.
Speaker 1 (45:50):
The like that have an amendment after Men's I described
it as a bit like cholesterol, you know, so these things,
you know, individually I might eat a couple l meals
that are a bit borderline.
Speaker 2 (46:02):
In terms of their relatively their health Star rating, for instance,
and individually not a bad decision. Collectively, though over time
at blocks it comes up the arteries and the same
sort of thing has happened in New South Wales over
fifty years, that sort of stuff the Planning Act. There's
been around one hundred and twenty different attempts through the
New South Wales Parliament over that time. To change the
(46:24):
act right, some with success, some without, and so it
all adds up over time, and every now and again
you have to reset that and that's what we're trying
to do at the moment.
Speaker 1 (46:33):
So you're how do you feel like, how do you
feel that you're going to be able to do what
your predecessors haven't been able to do in terms of
this fifty year old Bruce's Acts, which has been amended
so many times it doesn't look like an accent anymore.
Speaker 2 (46:49):
Yeah, that is the challenge. Look, I think I think
there's a willingness in the government to absolutely get on
with this. We've made a priority because we recognize that
we can't keep going on doing the same thing and
expecting a different result. And part of it is just
a general desire. I mean, I don't want to answer
to my nieces and nephews and say, well, you were
in a position where you had an opportunity for me
(47:11):
to go to get a house and you you're stuffed
it up. That's pretty powerful motivator in and of it,
because why why is it that I've got the shot
at it? And and not But look, we're also doing
some non legislative things, something that might interest you in
your your thinkers, We've got this pre sale finance guarantee.
Speaker 1 (47:31):
I saw that. It's amazing. Did you offer to developers?
Speaker 2 (47:33):
Yeah, that's image.
Speaker 1 (47:34):
You can explain it, yecause I just think and I
did say something recently about it. I thought, I think
that's one of the I'm not going to explain what is.
I get you explain it is. But I have said
publicly that this is one of the most innovative thing.
Won't put up on your Instagram page, I'm sure who's
page put up, but one of the most innovative government
and creative government financing enhancements that I've ever seen anywhere
(47:57):
in the world.
Speaker 2 (47:58):
Yeah, it's explain. That's pretty cool. The economist in me
loves this one. But so, what what happens is a
developer goes out, gets an approval. You know, they might
have one hundred units that've they've got approval for, and
the commercial lenders and say, okay, off the plan. You've
got to sell eighty percent of them before the banks
off Off the back of that, You've got to sell
(48:20):
eighty percent pre cell before we give you the finance
to start construction. Correct, right, So someone will go out
to their marketing campaign. Over the first three months they
might sell fifty percent. Great, but then it really starts
to slow up. And that's fine. People were making a
big investment they wanted to send to want to see
it and the like. I understand that, but what it
means is delay. So it can mean years getting that.
Speaker 1 (48:42):
Those developers cannot lay one brick.
Speaker 2 (48:44):
They can do it until they get that's right. So
what we're doing is using the government's balance sheet as
a bridge to that commercial finance. So if you get
to fifty percent of your pre sales you can come
and ask the government to get you have to get
fifty percent, yep, yep. So you get to fifty percent,
you can come and apply to the government to go
(49:04):
as guaranteur effectively, effectively the same as you might do
for your kids for their mortgage.
Speaker 1 (49:09):
So they have Insuran rental guarantee.
Speaker 2 (49:11):
That's right exactly. This is the new South Wales government guarantee.
And we're saying, right, we're going to commit to buying
that difference to get in say that last thirty percent,
for instance, up to fifty million dollars worth of properties
to get you over the line to get your commercial
finance to get you started. You can keep selling those
properties that we've guaranteed while you're building, and then if
(49:35):
you sell them, the guarantee falls away and we can
use it on another place. If, however, we get to
the end you've built them all and you say hang on,
I'm going to call on the guarantee, the New South
Wales government will buy those at a discount and then
we can use them either for social housing, affordable housing,
market rental, or we can sell ourselves and get the
money back. We've put a commitment of up to a
(49:56):
billion dollars behind that. It's it's definitely nationally leading, if
not world leading in terms of the size of it.
I think world And we're hopeful that this will actually
mean construction could get started on a whole lot more
projects than what it could what it would have done,
and the time it would have taken to eke out
(50:18):
the pre sales to get to commercial finance.
Speaker 1 (50:20):
And I think consumers audiences don't realize the reason a
lot of times developers don't proceed is because that developers
don't have the money they usually put in.
Speaker 2 (50:32):
We've got around fifteen thousand dwellings at any given time
or at the moment, So it's come down a bit,
but fifteen thousand dwellings at the moment that are approved
but not commenced, and we believe this will make a
big difference. We've already had we opened up for expressions
of interest last week about a week ago. We've already
had twenty two expressions of interest so far, and we're
(50:54):
hoping to be able to write the first provide the
first guarantees by the end of the year.
Speaker 1 (50:58):
And just so I understand a bit more, is the
guarantee delivered to the bank, or that a guarantee goes
to the development to.
Speaker 2 (51:03):
The bank, to the bank. So this is the bridge
to commercial fight. So we're not providing any finance at all.
All we're providing is essentially a guarantee, a bit of
essentially a bit of paper to say that we are
willing to guarantee these these particular dwellings. But it's bridge
to commercial file. So you've got to stack up. You've
got to be able to stack up and get your
(51:24):
commercial is to be right, yeah, and you've got to
get underway quick smart right. So we want we want
to be able to churn this guarantee as much as possible.
We can only churn that by getting people started on construction.
Speaker 1 (51:35):
And I think that one of the things is important
here and this is I actually I'm I'm a big fan.
I'm a Daniel Mookie fan of how he's maintained our
balance sheet. Because you know, our rating, our global rating
of New South Wales, which is triple A, is really important.
And most people don't realize therefore that the budgets are
really important because rating agencies done like stupid budgets, and
(52:00):
because if the if you, if you continually dish that
up to rating agencies, eventually they will re rate you
and your your rating will go down from tripa A,
which is what we enjoy here in New South Wales,
to some other number. And as soon as they start
doing that, your position, your your one billion dollars that
you're going to put out there into the marketplace is
available for developers that starts to get it becomes a
(52:23):
liability and that becomes a bit of a drama for you.
Speaker 2 (52:25):
Yeah, we couldn't do this without the strength of our
balance triple A rating. Yeah, that's right, and if we
as You're right, you absolutely point out if we drop
that rating, our interest bill goes up totally right, and
when our interest bill goes up, even though we've done
a lot of work to get our debt position under control,
we inherited the highest level of debt of one incoming
(52:46):
New South that any New South Wales government has handed
to another government. We're getting that under control. But if
we don't, then our interest bill, where we could be
paying higher wages to people, or we could be doing
more things in the public spaces portfolio, we could be
doing a whole range of other things. We can't do
that because instead we're paying interest on debt.
Speaker 1 (53:07):
And this is the problem in America at the moment.
But people don't realize the debt burden or the interest
rate payment burden which comes out of taxes you absolutely
you have to take from people here in your South Wales,
and the same thing if applies at a federal level.
But the interest rate burden increases quite significantly with a
rerating from triple A to some other huge different because
(53:27):
triple A is the best rating to get in the world,
like even the United States doesn't have a triple A rating.
I'm not sure Victoria has been rerated.
Speaker 2 (53:35):
I think yeah, I'm not sure what they are at
the moment.
Speaker 1 (53:37):
Australia Triple A. And I don't think most people understand
the importance of the interaction between what you're doing, the
billion dollar guarantee to developers and what Moogie does the
Treasury making sure that he puts out budgets that are responsible,
you know, relative to how agencies external rating agencies see
how balance it look like. The relationship is quite ynamic,
(54:00):
really important. It is.
Speaker 2 (54:02):
It's why we catch up on a regular basis, bloody critical.
But to put it in context, when we came when
we were first elected in March twenty twenty three, the
interest we're paying on the debt at that time, which
we've been able to reduce was the equivalent of what
we spend annually on the police and TAFE combined. Wow. Right,
(54:24):
that was just going in interest moments that had to
get be brought under control. You just can't run a government.
You can't run a health system, you can't run a
police force, a fire as if fire education, So you
can't run that when you're having to shovel more money
out the door in paying off interest on debt.
Speaker 1 (54:43):
Esspayly someone a buying a house that can't afford to own,
and they've got a massive mortgage on it, and in
every month they're paying out more in their mortgage than
they've been able to pay it for their kids school
fees and everything else. And something's going to suffer.
Speaker 2 (54:54):
That's right. You can only put it on the credit
card for so long before all the chickens come home
to roost.
Speaker 1 (55:00):
That's very good. I mean, I'm actually I really do
like that policy. And what you're trying to do is,
by the way, other states probably should start trying to
copy this.
Speaker 2 (55:09):
We've had inquiries. Yeah, we've had inquiries I think every
treasury and every planning department in every other state of
contact at our chives. Have we set this up?
Speaker 1 (55:19):
Yeah, And you're saying you've had twenty two submissions so far,
but when do you think you roll out your first one?
Speaker 2 (55:25):
I hope to do that before the end of the year.
Speaker 1 (55:26):
Okay. And as you say, it's fifteen thousand pre approved
apartment buildings whatever it is dwellings available to be done,
which needs probably of those most of those we finance
a lot of very feel actually they find itself with
the balance their own balancehit. Unless it's Harry triggerab Off.
Speaker 2 (55:43):
That's right, there's a few who have they have a
capacity over years and years of business to be able
to build up that most people don't. And we're aiming
at the mid tier developers, the guys who are building
no more than two million dollar properties. Yeah, so you're
not trying to trying to do the luxury apartments or
anything like that. We're trying to get some volume out
(56:05):
and support some volume coming out so that more people
have got a chance to get to a million. Unless
I appreciate it, you know, just too minute.
Speaker 1 (56:13):
Well, Minister Scully, Minister for New South Wales, Minister for
Planning and Public Spaces, I really appreciate you coming in
today and explaining to us, probably not all the details
going on your portfolio, because your portfolio is quite complex
and covers a lot of stuff and we probably don't
have enough time to talk about everything you do. But
I really appreciate your time and I actually think some
(56:35):
of these issues that you've spoke about today, for me,
especially this government guarantee, state government guarantee for developers relative
to their pre sales obligations in order for them to
get the deal off the table and start to be built,
is one of the most innovative that I've ever seen
from a government. In fact, I'd say pretty ballsy.
Speaker 2 (56:55):
Yeah, it's not just innovative. Well, the history has always
been subsidy, and this is no subsidy. This is just
using the charge for that we do. We do charge it.
There's a credit for a line, but that recovers the cost.
Speaker 1 (57:08):
Of administering it, just like during the just just laying
the during the GFC, the federal government put up a
deposit guarantee four banks. They did, but they didn't charge them.
Now they do.
Speaker 2 (57:21):
They do charge them, but then we've set it up
so so that recovers the cost of administering That's exactly right.
So there are costs, we've got to recover those. But
you know, I think this is a really this is
something I've been wanting to introduce for it for a
long time. So I'm glad we were able to get
it over the line.
Speaker 1 (57:39):
Well done, Thank you, thanks very much, Thanks thanks for
having me on. Appreciate it.
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