3 months ago
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Commonwealth Bank boss Matt Comyn wants Australia’s net migration to be tens of thousands of people a year lower than the government is forecasting to help improve housing affordability as the Coalition spoils for a fight over the issue.
Speaking at a committee hearing at Parliament House on Tuesday morning, the boss of the nation’s biggest bank said having a predictable level of migration would help housing supply and infrastructure keep up with demand.
CBA boss Matt Comyn said the growth in home loans probably needed to slow down.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
“Perhaps that number is something in the order of 180,000 per annum,” said Comyn, stressing it was a personal view. “It gives both the Commonwealth and states the ability to plan for critical infrastructure, including housing.”
The government is forecasting net overseas migration to fall to 260,000 this financial year, then to 225,000 in 2026-27 and for the rest of the decade. Opposition Leader Sussan Ley has declared she would lower migration if elected, with the Coalition contemplating a cut of more than 100,000 people a year from current levels.
Labor does not have a migration target.
Comyn acknowledged having an ambitious or aspirational target “may at times be politically unwise” but said it was ultimately a good thing. “I think having a target is important,” he said.
Increasing supply is also key to improving housing affordability, Comyn said, but noted there were barriers to doing so.
“You need a lot of coordination between the federal and the state level,” he said. “I think the availability of labour, of skilled labour in and around multiple sectors, including this one, is challenged.”
Comyn, who heads the nation’s largest provider of mortgages, said growth in housing credit probably also needs to slow from its current level, noting it was growing at 6 per cent annually at present, and at a faster rate among investors.
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He said that was a little higher than “policymakers and regulators” may be comfortable with.
Pressed on the impact of the federal government’s expansion of its 5 per cent deposit scheme, which some critics have claimed is pushing up property prices, Comyn said the policy would only be a “very, very small element” of the current growth in prices.
The 5 per cent deposit scheme allows first homebuyers with a deposit of at least 5 per cent to forego lenders mortgage insurance which can add thousands of dollars onto the cost of buying a home.
From October, the government expanded the scheme by scrapping the limit on the amount of income people could earn to be eligible for the scheme and lifting the cap on property prices eligible to be purchased under the policy.
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