Whether it's acheiving the dream of home ownership, ensuring buildings are efficient, safe and sustainable, or delivering raods and hospitals; building and construction is central to helping the community acheive their aspirations and meeting expectations.

The problem is that costs keep going up - putting new homes out of reach for many ordinary Australians and making the community pay more for much needed public infrastructure. State and local government levies, taxes and rules keep on getting bigger and changing the way homes are taxed will make this problem even worse. 

Everyone understands that buildings need to be safe, sustainable and efficient - the challenge is to make sure this can happen without pushing up costs for everyday families and communities. 

Master Builders Australia wants to work the Federal Government to acheive this aim through several key policies. 

Safe, Efficient &
Quality Buildings

Everyone agrees that we need safe, efficient and quality buildings. We want to work with governments at all levels to acheive these things in a smart, effective way that doesn't force up costs. 

We want to the Federal Government to: 

• Ensure that the National Construction Code (NCC) is practical and effective, by retaining Federal oversight to guard against changes by stealth. 
• Show leadership in improving the way state regulators enforce building rules and improving consistency around Australia, and provide all the necessary resources to help the work of the Australian Building Codes Board (ABCB). 
• Promise to ensure all proposed changes to technical building regulations are thoroughly vetted to make sure they will actually work. 
• Make no changes to energy stringency rules unless they are market-driven and come at no cost to ordinary Australians. 

Meet The Housing Needs
Of All Australians

The adequate supply of appropriate and affordable hosing is a critical part of the Australian economic and social fabric. As a nation, Australia has one of the highest rates of home-ownership in the world. But the cost of a family home, over the past decade, is pushing home ownership  out of reach many Australians. We want the Federal Government to: 

• Make no changes to the Negative Gearing rules or to Capital Gains Tax. 
• Maintain the tax-free status of the family home. 
• Work with industry to tackle ever increasing levies, charges and taxes imposed by state and local governments which are passed in turn to home owners. 
• Fix the uncordinated, excessive and unncessary planning, buiding and environmental regulations which simply don't work and make new homes more expensive. 
• Implement the recommendation in Master Builders 'Unblocking Supply' report. 

Deliver Much Needed
Community Infrastructure

It's so important that the community gets more schools, roads and hospitals delivered on-time and in a way that doesn't waste the taxpayer's money. We want the next Federal Government: 

• Continue to increase infrastructure spending. 
• Support the ongoing role Infrastructure plays in coordinating infrastructure planning and investment. 
• Build on policies that coordinate levels of government and incentivise state and territories to improve policy for housing.