That's not true. You can set a new tab to open on your homepage. It's in the general tab of the preferences (the very first tab you see). "New tabs open with" {favorites, top sites, homepage, empty page, same page}.

That’s what I said - unless you specifically set it up to navigate to home on a new tab.

Pedantically, specifically navigating to a page (e.g. by clicking the home button) is different from specifically setting it up so it automatically navigates for you.

In this context that difference (config option vs manual action for each new tab) is important.