Labor rift as Anthony Albanese’s ‘dear comrade’ breaks ranks and slams the PM’s policy pledge fuelling Australia’s housing crisis

One of Anthony Albanese’s closest friends in politics has blamed a major reversal in Labor policy for fueling Australia’s housing crisis by giving landlords lucrative tax breaks.

Doug Cameron, former Labor senator for New South Wales, said the negative tax breaks for landlords and the 50 per cent reduction in capital gains tax had made homes unaffordable.

“Negative gearing and capital gains tax are part of the problem – it’s a complex issue,” he told Daily Mail Australia.

“It is politically difficult, but the test for political parties is whether they are prepared to tackle the difficult political questions.”

In 2019, Albanese dumped predecessor Bill Shorten’s plan to abolish negative gearing for future property purchases and halve the 50 percent capital gains tax credit.

Three years later he became prime minister after unsuccessfully abandoning Labor’s policies leading to the 2016 and 2019 elections.

Cameron is so concerned about unaffordable housing that he will co-chair a two-day People’s Commission on the Housing Crisis in May, along with Everybody’s Home, a homelessness advocacy group, and housing expert Professor Nicole Gurran of the University of Sydney.

In a statement, the former union leader blamed policies that led to real estate speculation driving up prices.

“The dominance of neoliberal politics has led to housing being treated as a tool for individual wealth creation and the ‘market’, rather than as a human right that enables effective participation in a good society and the economy,” said he.

Anthony Albanese in 2019 ditched his predecessor Bill Shorten’s plan to abolish negative gearing for future property purchases and halve the 50 percent capital gains tax rebate (they are pictured, far left and far right, in 2022 with Social Services Minister Affairs Amanda Rishworth and then Australian of the Year Dylan Alcott)

“The committee will listen to many of the victims of a system that fails to provide a fair and equitable approach to housing.”

Now in government, Labor has a $10 billion Housing Australia Future Fund, which aims to build 30,000 social homes in five years.

But Cameron, who remains a member of the Labor Party, said Labor policies were unambitious and had failed to embrace technological advances to build more homes.

‘Yes I do. I think it will be necessary for governments to continually review their approach to housing,” he told Daily Mail Australia.

‘It’s one of the biggest social and economic problems we have.

‘From my experience I think the more homes we can deliver, the better.

‘Some of the problems we have is that we are not embracing some of the new technologies that are being embraced abroad, such as modular homes, which are cheaper to build, faster to build and cost less in terms of heating and cooling .’

House prices in the capital rose 10.6 per cent to $956,782 in the year to March, putting it out of reach for a middle-income borrower on a $98,218 salary who can only afford a $639,000 house with a mortgage of 20 percent.

Property prices rose across Australia for the 14th month in a row, CoreLogic data released this week showed, even as the Reserve Bank raised interest rates in November for the 13th time in 18 months to a 12-year high of 4.35 percent.

But Cameron was reluctant to blame the housing shortage on record high immigration inflows of 548,800 in the year to September, even though only 170,215 homes were built in the same period.

“Population growth is a problem, always has been a problem, but I don’t think it’s the only problem,” he said.

‘It is a much more complex problem that requires a more sophisticated political and social analysis.’

Mr Cameron blamed negative gearing and the 50 per cent cut in capital gains tax for property becoming an ‘instrument of wealth’ (a queue for Bondi rentals in Sydney is pictured)

Albanese was photographed in April 2019 hugging Cameron as he delivered his final speech in the Senate

Albanese was photographed in April 2019 hugging Cameron as he delivered his final speech in the Senate.

“After the farewell speech of my dear comrade and friend Doug Cameron,” he said on Facebook about the fellow left-wing Labor party member.

“Thank you for everything you’ve done here.”

The government of former Liberal Prime Minister John Howard introduced the 50 percent capital gains tax credit in 1999.

One of his Labor predecessors, Bob Hawke, reintroduced negative gearing in 1987, just two years after its abolition.

Daily Mail Australia contacted Mr Albanese’s office on Wednesday for a right of reply.