Renowned for bashing the banks or grilling corporations about their tax arrangements in Senate estimates, Labor's Sam Dastyari has no shortage of critics but it's rare one of them calls him a "snob".
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But that's how he's been labelled after releasing a new short film on social media at the weekend titled $1 Million in Sydney in a bid to draw attention to Sydney's housing prices.
In the video, it's "another morning of auctions in Sydney" as Canberra's version of Martin Scorsese travels to the outer suburbs of Ryde, Northmead and Toongabbie on board the "Bill Shorten Bus" to showcase what $1 million would secure potential homeowners.
Spoiler alert, "not much", he says before gesturing to a "classic house, immaculately kept" and located on "one of of the busiest roads of Sydney".
"You know if it's got security shutters, you're onto a good thing."
He then heads to a vacant block in Toongabbie - "an hour and 20 minutes away [from the CBD] in peak hour traffic", that has the "advantages" of access to a train line and a power station across the street.
A scene filmed in Northmead is just as bleak.
"This is what a million dollars will buy you in Northmead.
"But it's OK because it's described as having a functional kitchen. For a f---ing million dollars you'd like to think the kitchen would work," he says before piling furniture left out for curbside collection into the bus.
"If you gotta save a million bucks, you gotta be prepared to be a little bit frugal," as he has three assistants load up the loot.
Dastyari crunches the numbers on an average Sydney mortgage of $900,000 over a 30-year term on the interest rate of 5.29 per cent. Weekly repayments total $1050.
"Now, I'm sorry, but that's just not affordable," he says.
The video has since been viewed more than 510,000 times.
However the owners of the home in Ryde, which sold for auction on Saturday for $1.3 million, have lashed out at the senator in The Australian newspaper on Monday for his housing "snobbery".
The Australian quoted 46-year-old Leanne Carabetta saying she had taken "great offence" at Senator Dastyari's "snobbery".
But Senator Dastyari told News Corp the basis of his latest production was a "cry for reform??".
"Borrowing $900,000 for a $1 million first home locks people out," he said.
The senator's video makes no mention of Bill Shorten's previously released housing affordability package, which includes a proposal to double the fees imposed on foreign buyers snapping up residential properties and a nationwide tax on landlords who deliberately leave their properties vacant.
