Emeritus Professor Hal Pawson

Topic: Housing policy in Australia: A critique of recent developments

After a bleak decade of inaction and complacency, Australia has seen notable and wide-scale official re-engagement with housing policy challenges during the early 2020s, not only at the federal level, but also in most states and territories. Drawing on the recently published second edition of ‘Housing Policy in Australia: A case for system reform’ (October 2025), this presentation will outline and reflect on these developments. It will also assess the currently dominant narrative on the ‘affordability crisis’ that sees the issue as largely explicable in terms of ‘inadequate housing supply’.

Hal Pawson is an Emeritus Professor at the University of New South Wales, Sydney where he was formerly Professor of Housing Research and Policy in the City Futures Research Centre (2011-2025). A member of the Academy of Social Sciences of Australia, his published research spans many aspects of housing policy and market analysis. He is lead author of the Australian Homelessness Monitor series (2018-24) and a contributor to the thirty published reports in the UK Homelessness Monitors series (2011-25). His latest co-authored books include ‘Housing Policy in Australia: A case for system reform’ (Second Edition 2025).

Adjunct Professor Julie Lawson

Topic: European Housing Policy:  a systemic and integrated approach

Australia today faces converging crises—diminishing access to adequate housing, record levels of household debt, and an energy-inefficient, carbon-intensive housing stock and urban form. Across Europe, governments have faced similar pressures and have concluded that housing justice is integral to economic, social, and climate stability. Using the UN report #Housing2030 as a policy guide, ministers recognised that affordable, energy-secure homes are vital public infrastructure. The EU Recovery and Resilience Facility also demonstrated that crisis funding can do more than stimulate jobs, it can also promote significant reform towards more inclusive and fiscally sustainable models of affordable rental housing. The newly established European Housing Task Force will soon deliver Europe’s first Affordable Housing Plan—combining affordability and social inclusion, with sustainability and fiscal responsibility.

Europe is also working to control short-term letting platforms and increase investment in affordable rental housing, including for students and young households. It continues to promote a continent-wide agenda for energy efficiency, retrofitting, circular economy, and decarbonisation to reduce emissions and address energy poverty. At the same time, reforms to State aid and SGEI rules are planned for the end of 2025, allowing public investment in socially inclusive and affordable housing. The Responsible Housing Finance Summit supports revolving equity funds and national intermediaries in mobilising patient capital and expanding housing assets. We also observe how international best practices from Austria, Denmark, Poland, and Czechia are being shared with Ukraine, illustrating how inclusion and long-term fiscal responsibility can be established even in volatile conditions. France’s Olympic housing village has already received much attention from Brisbane’s organisers.

In addressing its own challenges, Australia should study and adopt relevant European reforms that focus on long-term public value, replacing fragmented opaque deals with robust and responsible institutions that build equity and ensure affordability for future generations. Learning from Europe’s systemic reforms and integrated approach offers Australia a more coherent path to restore access, sustainability, and justice to its housing system.

Dr Julie Lawson is an internationally recognised housing systems researcher and policy adviser with over 30 years of experience in connecting evidence to reform. As an Adjunct Professor at RMIT University’s Centre for Urban Research and Director of Just Cities, she has led significant studies on national housing strategies, housing finance, social housing and land policy across Europe and Australia.

She is the principal author of the landmark UN report #Housing2030, prepared for UN-Habitat, UNECE and Housing Europe, key partner in EU Horizon Equal Housing initiative, and a Senior Housing Expert for the European Commission supporting Ukraine’s housing recovery. Her recent work has advanced understanding of national housing strategies, housing finance, capital investment, affordable rental housing and tenancy regulation, as well as land policies and consumer advocacy to improve access to adequate housing. 

Julie is a co-author of many Australian research reports which have influenced policy thinking, institutional development and effective regulation. She is a long-term board member of the journals Housing Theory and Society and Critical Housing Analysis and also serves as Co-Chair of the ENHR Working Groups on Crises, Conflict and Recovery and Housing and Social Theory. Her research continues to shape housing policy debates across Europe and Australia—promoting reforms for stability and sustainable recovery, strong public governance, and the right to adequate housing as a foundation for economic and climate resilience.