The biggest risk for a government making something an issue is that then they're often expected to follow through on it. And for some reason the Turnbull government has decided that housing affordability is one of the hills upon which it should die.

See, your friend and Treasurer Scott Morrison knows that you, The Average Australian, are concerned about housing prices in Australia. Not just buying houses but the slow march of increasing rents, which is driving working people to homelessness while social housing is being sold off at a rate of knots, as happened with the Sirius apartments in Millers Point since poor people certainly don't deserve views of Sydney Harbour.

"We're working on a package for the budget. It will deal with the challenges in housing affordability from those who are reliant on social housing in our community, all the way through to those who are trying to break in to the first home ownership market," Morrison told Sky News on Sunday. And housing is a legitimate problem that needs swift and decisive action.

So it's odd that the Turnbull government has chosen to take it on, since they have deliberately chosen to rule out any of the things they have the power to actually do - like change negative gearing or capital gains advantages - in favour of things which are state and local government responsibilities, like selling off public land and approving developments.