Short Stay Levy Bill 2026
[5.16 p.m.]
Ms BURNET (Clark) - Honourable Speaker, I rise to speak about the Short Stay Levy Bill 2026. I'd like to thank the Treasurer and Treasury staff for the briefing and following up on many of our questions.
The primary question I have been trying to understand is: what is this bill actually trying to achieve? The government has sought to characterise this bill as a revenue‑raising measure, but when you examine the exemptions to the levy, it becomes clear that it is fundamentally informed by the impact of short-stay accommodation on the rental market. This is evident in the explanatory material accompanying the bill.
Under the bill, the levy will not apply to accommodations such as hotels, motels, inns, hostels and similar premises, bed and breakfasts and caravan parks, specialist accommodation including student housing, emergency or crisis housing and other categories declared by the minister, and accommodation within a dwelling that is usually occupied by the owner. Why is that? If this were genuinely about maximising revenue, wouldn't the levy also apply to those types of accommodation? The answer is clear. It doesn't apply to these categories because they are not typically part of the long-term rental market. In other words, the design of the levy implicitly recognises that short-stay accommodation is affecting housing supply.
I want to touch on something that the member for Clark, Mr Bayley, made reference to, and that was the upper House inquiry in 2019, I believe, on short-stay accommodation. In particular I want to reference city councillor Holly Ewin at the time - later councillor Jax Fox. Holly, as a young person in 2019, was bemoaning the fact that the government wasn't acting on the impacts of short-stay accommodation. Holly went through a lot of problems with finding housing themselves, and I believe this is a clear indictment of lack of action from that point where the government knew full well the impacts on young people and, as Mr Bayley has pointed out, on so many people, particularly in this city.
If it was generally about maximising revenue, wouldn't the levy apply to those types of accommodation as well? Well, the answer is clear. It doesn't apply to those categories because they are not typically part of the long-term rental market. In other words, the design of the levy implicitly recognises that short-stay accommodation is affecting housing supply.
Turning to revenue - this measure will not raise very much at all. It's hardly going to balance the books, Treasurer. Treasury's latest estimate, after expanding the exemptions, is around $7 million annually. In the context of our budget deficit, that is a rounding error. Let me be clear - I support the government's efforts to raise revenue. These measures are rarely popular, but after years of financial mismanagement, we are now confronted with a budget shortfall that must be addressed before it worsens further.
I also support evidence-based policy that genuinely addresses Tasmania's housing crisis, particularly measures that prevent the loss of long-term rental properties to the short-stay market. I do not believe this bill will achieve that. A 5 per cent levy is unlikely to change behaviour. This point has been raised repeatedly in submissions. Victoria clearly reached the same conclusion. That is why it imposed a 7.5 per cent levy. Indeed, this government itself seems to accept that the levy will not materially alter investor behaviour, given its insistence that revenue, not behavioural change, is the primary objective.
A genuinely evidence-based response to the housing shortage would begin by asking what is driving the shortage and where are the shortages most acute, and how do they vary across regions. But the bill doesn't do that. It does not even expressly acknowledge that short‑term accommodation contributes to rental shortages, nor does it recognise that a uniform statewide approach may not be appropriate in some areas, particularly with those farm stays or agritourism. It is far from clear that rental shortages are driven by short-stay activity, or that there is a rental shortage, and I welcome the amendments flagged by Mr Bayley.
I am concerned that this bill is not grounded in evidence and I am not alone. The Short Stay Accommodation Association of Australia (SSAAA) has argued that the bill lacks an evidentiary basis and that no modelling has been released on its likely impact. They have also raised concerns about the minister's power to exempt classes or premises by order, a matter I intend to address through amendment.
In relation to the question of what evidence has informed this bill, I have several questions for the Treasurer. Firstly, when the government delayed this bill last year, it stated that it wanted to observe the implementation of Victoria's reforms. What specific data has been gathered from Victoria and what conclusions have been drawn?
My second question: when this policy was announced as part of the 2030 Strong Plan, the government acknowledged that the growth of short-stay accommodation had reduced the availability of long-term rentals and contributed to higher rents. What modelling has been undertaken taken since then to understand the projected impact of short-stay accommodation on rental supply in Tasmania, and will this policy have any measurable effect on rental prices?
Thirdly, given Victoria's 7.5 per cent levy, how did the government settle on 5 per cent? What modelling supports this figure?
The pressure that the short-stay industries place on the long-term rental market is not a new issue. We all know how that impacts our rental availability. The government recognised the risks associated with the short-stay sector years ago, when it passed legislation in 2019. At that time, the then-minister emphasised the need for robust data collection to understand the extent to which homes were being converted to short-stay use. I will now read into Hansard a couple of those passages from his speech. I quote:
We need more detailed and accurate information about the use of homes for short stay accommodation to enable better policy informed by robust data.
...
The Bill will also provide information to Government that will lead to a better understanding of the impact of short stay accommodation on the broader housing market, particularly the extent of conversion of entire houses in residential areas to short stay accommodation.
Yet little progress has been made in collecting reliable data, let alone using the data to inform policy decision. By the government's own admission, the data it collects is incomplete and unreliable. In its most recent report, Quarter Three of 2024, the Director of Building noted that over 2100 addresses could not be matched to valid Tasmanian addresses and more than 5200 properties were listed multiple times.
No further reports have been released since, and it is probably no wonder, but this lack of reliable data has prevented experts such as Professor Peter Phibbs, from continuing detailed analysis of the sector's impact on Tasmania's housing market for Shelter Tasmania.
Submissions from the Local Government Association and the Hobart City Council make the same point. The data-sharing and enforcement framework under the 2019 act is not functioning effectively. As a result, policy makers are operating without a clear understanding of the problem. Indeed, during a recent Treasury briefing, officials acknowledged that they do not know how large the short-stay sector actually is, making revenue projections inherently uncertain.
This is an industry that resists regulation, often by pointing to the absence of reliable data. That is precisely why better data collection and transparency are essential, and I would therefore be moving an amendment to require that data collected through this levy be reported annually. More broadly, the only effective way to regulate this sector is to empower local government. State-based approaches don't work, yet the state has consistently failed to act.
As Hobart City Council has stated in their submission and I quote:
In the absence of comprehensive State-level controls on the scale, location and intensity of short stay accommodation, local governments have been required to take increasingly complex planning, strategic and compliance measures to manage the loss of long-term rental stock and protect residential amenity.
I want to touch on some of those experiences that the Hobart City Council has gone through and I count no less than nine interventions that the council has done, and I certainly have lived this in the past being a former member of the council. I might say that this council has worked really hard to address the issue of short-stay accommodation and the impacts on rental and affordability in our city for key workers and so forth.
This problem is not only related to Hobart; it is related to other local government areas, councils, which may not have the means by which to pursue this. This is a very frustrating point for many councils.
I'll list these. In February 2021, the council resolved to prepare a report on possible amendments to its planning scheme to control the number of short-term accommodation. August 2021, the council resolved to pursue inserting one or more specific area plans than local provision scheduled that prohibit entire-home short-stay accommodation use.
In November 2021, the mayor wrote to the planning minister, I think that was minister Jaensch at the time, requesting prohibitions for the entire-home, short-term accommodation permits within the local government area and more broadly. Then the Planning minister advised the HCC to seek an amendment through the interim planning scheme, and if approved the planning purposes notice can be issued to relieve the scheme for the mandatory application of Planning Directive 6 or seek variations to the specific area plans through the development of its draft local planning scheme.
In March 2022, the council took the minister's advice and applied to the TPC, but that was in vain as well. In February 2023, the TPC refused to proceed with the assessment of the draft amendment on the basis that it would be inconsistent with the requirements of Planning Directive 6.
In June 2023, the council moved to double rates on short-stay properties in residential areas, which is still in place. In 2024, the council applied to update their planning scheme to the new Tasmanian Planning System and introduce a specific area plan to prohibit short-stay accommodation within residential zones of the city. The TPC advised the council that it was inappropriate to consider the special area plan before the local planning scheme was finally finalised.
Frustration after frustration. As Mr Bayley has said, HCC has now voted in favour of making a massive fee increase for application for the change-of-use permits for short-stay accommodation, but that's only from this point on.
Since 2021, the council has made repeated attempts to regulate short-stay accommodation through planning controls, only to face delays, obfuscation, refusals and procedural barriers. Meanwhile, properties continue to be converted to short-stay use, further tightening the rental market. The situation is unworkable. It raises a fundamental question: why won't the government give councils the tools they need to manage this issue? In failing to act decisively, the government is not only letting down local councils, it is also letting down the 30 per cent of Tasmanians who rent.
As Shelter Tasmania and the tenants' union have pointed out, and I quote:
When rental homes are diverted to short-stay, even slight changes in the number of available properties for rent can mean critical changes in the vacancy rate.
That means putting a roof over people's heads:
This pushes rental prices up and increases competition for the remaining long‑term rentals.
At the same time, the current settings disadvantage first home buyers. They allow investors to acquire properties and convert them into short-stay accommodation, pushing up prices and placing home ownership further out of reach. This simply pushes up house prices to the point where they are unaffordable to all but the most privileged, putting further pressure on the rental market and the social housing safety net, leading to an ever‑increasing wait list for social housing. We are seeing the consequences of this play out in real time, and yet the government's response remains a very, very light touch.
The underlying philosophy appears to be one of minimal intervention, prioritising investor confidence over market stability, but the result is a housing system under severe strain and renters are bearing the brunt. Effective regulation of the short-stay sector requires meaningful data, data sharing from platforms, verification of listings and enforcement mechanisms that do not rely solely on complaints. It also requires regulators willing to enforce the rules.
I look forward to the Attorney‑General tabling the response to my question this morning about how many infringement notices have been issued by CBOS in response to the failure of short-stay accommodation owners and booking platforms to comply with the obligations this parliament imposed back in 2019. Effective data sharing is critical; without it, government is operating in the dark while platforms retain complete visibility over the market. If we want effective regulation, we must address this imbalance.
In closing, this bill is not the right solution, but it is better than nothing. For that reason, I will support it. However, it could be significantly improved. It could raise more revenue and direct that revenue into social housing - amendments that I will heartily support from Ms Johnston, who I believe will be moving that - and it could strengthen data collection and transparency amendments that I will be moving. I do have copies of amendments if anybody needs that. Really, there is a lot more that can be done to rein in short stay, but I will be supporting this measure to bring in some revenue for the government.