Responding to opposition claims that the government's housing policy has failed, Office for Government Policy Coordination Chief Lim Ki-keun said the problem can only be solved if "each and every citizen applies a full-court press." The conservative opposition immediately criticized the remark as an attempt to spread responsibility onto the public.
Lim made the comment on the 13th during a National Assembly Political Affairs Committee audit, in response to questions from Rep. Kim Jae-sup of the People Power Party. Kim said there was no sign of the housing market cooling since the government's first housing measure last year, and asked whether the past year of housing policy had failed. He also pressed the government on its supply pledge, noting that it had promised about 1.4 million homes while previous administrations took seven years to supply 290,000 units. "How are you going to supply 1.4 million homes within five years?" he asked.
Lim said the government would work to ensure construction begins on 1.39 million homes by 2030. "Solving the problem requires an all-out effort," he said. "Each and every citizen has to apply a full-court press for this problem to be solved."
Kim criticized the remark as "the kind of comment that spreads responsibility onto the public." He added: "The president said taming the housing market was easier than clearing up the valleys, so what is this about mobilizing the entire public to tame housing?" He said the president should take responsibility for having spoken with such confidence, and asked: "What have the people done wrong? What are you demanding of them?"
At the same audit, Rep. Shin Dong-wook of the People Power Party expressed concern about plans to create a real estate oversight agency under the prime minister. "Is it a reasonable bill that allows 80,000 cases of financial transaction information to be examined without a warrant?" he said, criticizing it as legislation that infringes on private property rights.
Rep. Choi Eun-seok of the same party described the government's introduction of single-stock leveraged exchange-traded funds as "a disaster that vaporized tens of trillions of won in our citizens' assets." He argued that after the decision was made at a closed-door presidential office meeting in January, the Office for Government Policy Coordination and other relevant ministries neglected their duties for three months until it cleared the Cabinet meeting in April. "The government's internal control system did not work at all," he said.
Meanwhile, Rep. Song Eon-seog of the People Power Party criticized the prime minister's office for failing to submit records on special activity expenses, business promotion expenses and special duty expenses. "I asked for the execution records and not a single one came," he said. "How can we conduct a proper parliamentary audit?"