Ahead of the May federal election, Labor campaigned on a $43 billion housing agenda, which includes building 1.2 million homes by 2029 to achieve the National Accord Target, with frontbenchers proudly labelling it “ambitious”.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said Bullock’s remarks were “common sense” as it “takes time to build a home”, promising an “acceleration” of building in later years.

A spokesperson for Housing Minister Clare O’Neil said on Tuesday: “Homes don’t get built overnight, but we are seeing a real turnaround in home building right across the country.”

On track to build 1.2 million homes? Not quite

In May, a report by the National Housing Supply and Affordability Council declared that at the current pace, the government would fall 262,000 homes short.

Source: SBS News

Analysing market changes over five years, it found that while housing prices and rents had soared since 2018-19, approval and completion rates were lagging.

Building approvals had also been on the decline. However, the latest ABS data, released at the end of September, shows the number of units approved for construction was up 3 per cent over 12 months, despite being down 6 per cent in August.

Master Builders Australia estimates one million homes will be built by 2029, also falling short, but CEO Denita Wawn says under the right conditions, the gap can be bridged.

“The reason for that really is to do with the lack of skilled people to undertake that work, an inadequate amount of build-ready land, and delays, meaning that there are escalating costs.”

What can the government do to catch up?

However, she believes the government can speed up construction by fast-tracking planning, focusing on skilled migration to attract the roughly 100,000 extra workers needed, and retraining people who didn’t complete apprenticeships.

“Accessing greenfield sites [undeveloped land] because of poor planning or public transport … has added to the cost and to the time taken to construct new housing,” he said.

“There’s a whole of factors involved, and while boosting supply is important, there’s no magic bullet that will enable it to happen quickly.”