Liberals shift housing target goalpost again as cuts to Building Tasmania loom
The Tasmanian Liberal Government has once again shifted the goalposts on its social and affordable housing target, as cuts loom in the department tasked with delivering the homes.
In 2022, the Liberals announced an ambitious target to build and acquire 10,000 social and affordable homes.
It didn’t take them long to water down their target to count vacant lots of land and existing rentals.
Then, on Saturday when most eyes were on the AFL Grand Final, Kerry Vincent announced he’d moved the goalposts again – in the interests of “transparency”.
In the July 2026 dashboard Homes Tasmania reported it had reached an important milestone by passing the hallway point of the target, with 5,071 households now having “achieved a housing outcome”.
August’s new dashboard shows a month later the tally had magically jumped to 5,768 with the Government now counting First Home Owner Grants towards the target.
You’d think a 700 increase in social and affordable homes would be cause for celebration, but the massive boost didn’t even rate a mention in the Minister’s media release – presumably because it was nothing more than an accounting trick.
Nor was there mention of number of applicants on the housing register, which has risen 10 per cent over the past 12 months to a record 5,830 applicants.
If the Government is exceeding its targets like it claims, why is the number of Tasmanians waiting for housing still going up and up and up?
After 13 years of the Liberals Tasmania desperately needs more homes, but this Government’s only answer is creative accounting and cutting jobs from the department tasked with building them.
