Australia politics live: DeepSeek ban on government devices; agents see house prices rising in 2025

Krishani Dhanji here with you as we continue on the first sitting week of the year. Yesterday was all about lunch, so what’s the government’s main meal going to be today?. You can expect some of that chatter to continue, but we’re expecting some debate on the hate crimes legislation today, after independents Allegra Spender and Jacqui Lambie introduced a motion on antisemitism to the house and Senate yesterday.

And Martin has already flagged the governmental DeepSeek ban announced overnight – we’ll likely see more discussion on that today too. Let’s get started. Most real estate professionals expect a continuing climb in house prices ahead of anticipated interest rate cuts and a federal election where home ownership will remain a policy priority, Australian Associated Press reports. Queensland is expected to continue its rise in 2025, buoyed by interstate migration, while Melbourne’s subdued performance could turn around, as falling values stoke renewed demand.

But the pace of growth may slow with affordability constraints remaining. The predictions come from a CoreLogic survey, released today, of more than 2,400 real estate professionals across the property and finance industries. “While we do expect values to finish 2025 higher, the pace of increase will probably be softer than the 4.9% achieved in 2024,” the firm’s head of research, Eliza Owen, said.

Almost two-thirds of those surveyed expected prices to increase, with a quarter of them expecting growth to exceed 5%. Only 12% of respondents expected a decrease and the vast majority of them expected values to fall less than 5%. CoreLogic earlier reported a slight downturn in prices in the nation’s most populous cities – Sydney and Melbourne – and slowing growth in other capitals to end 2024, but it is expected to be short-lived.

Possible interest rate cuts before the election could fuel an uptick in demand by boosting borrowing capacity but there remains a need for more homes to be built. The federal and state governments have an agreed target to deliver 1.2m new homes by mid-2029, but figures for the December quarter show construction activity remains considerably below the 60,000 required every three months. Funding for projects that could support construction is another part of the government’s plan, while the Coalition has also promised $5bn in grants and concessional loans to fund development-enabling infrastructure if elected.

Good morning and welcome to our live news blog. I’m Martin Farrer with some of our best overnight stories before Krishani Dhanji takes the reins. Amid a scramble by Australian officials to reorientate policy in the wake of Donald Trump’s election win, Kevin Rudd seemed to sum it up best. “Interesting times. Too interesting,” he said in an email which is part of FoI cache obtained by our reporters. Our full report reveals how Australian officials grappled with the incoming US president’s “unclear” trade proposals in the wake of his November win and what impact they might have on Australia.

With immigration likely to be a key issue in this year’s federal election, we report on a new study today that shows voters have a nuanced view of the issue. While the majority would like lower levels of migration, they support more skilled migration and change their views when given more information about how more migrant workers could help build more houses and therefore ease the housing crisis. It comes as a new report by the data analysis firm CoreLogic suggests lack of supply will continue to push house prices higher this year. More coming up.

The federal government has issued a ban on all products, applications and services made by the China-based AI company DeepSeek and has ordered that they must be removed from federal government systems and devices. Australian users have been encouraged to review any company’s privacy policies to understand how their data is used. In a statement last night, the home affairs minister, Tony Burke, said the government “will not hesitate to act” against a national security risk.