30 October 2025
The Hon. R.A. SIMMS (16:21): I thank honourable members for their contributions. I did have a glimmer of hope when I saw the Hon. Russell Wortley rising to his feet rather than the usual suspect who is deployed to kill off my bills but, no, in this instance unfortunately the answer was still a no—very disappointing.
As has been articulated, I think very well by the Hon. Jing Lee, this is a really modest proposal. We are in the middle of the worst housing crisis we have seen for generations and more and more people are struggling to get into the housing market than ever before. In the ACT they have a very effective way of managing this question of building inspection reports where they require the seller of the property to commission a building inspection report, and that report is then provided as part of the Form 1 process.
The benefit of that, of course, is that the same information is available to every prospective buyer and you do not have a situation where a prospective buyer is disincentivised from taking out a building inspection report because they think the owner may not accept a conditional offer, but you also ensure that all of the information is made available and it is less of a financial impost on the potential purchaser, particularly if one considers, as the Hon. Jing Lee identified, when you are looking at a home you may be required to put in multiple building inspection reports, and at $500 a pop that can be an additional cost that a prospective buyer does not want.
This is a pretty simple, straightforward, cost-of-living measure. It is disappointing to see that it is not being supported by the government or, I understand, the Liberal opposition, but I hope that people consider this idea again in the future.