Housing, health, and the cost of living are the three priorities for the ACT government in next week’s Budget, Chief Minister Andrew Barr announced today, and a $20 million funding package for homelessness services will provide “immediate relief and support for people who are doing it tough at the moment”, until new housing can be built. (A major announcement will be made tomorrow.)
“We’re not going to solve homelessness through the specialist homelessness services sector,” Rebecca Vassarotti, ACT minister for homelessness and housing services, said, “but what we can do is ensure that services are well resourced and supported to provide help for those people who need it the most.”
- Housing minister wants to eliminate homelessness in the ACT (8 September 2022)
- ACT Government’s plan for homelessness is “a milestone” (2 November 2022)
Homelessness services face significant demand because people are in rental and mortgage stress, Ms Vassarotti said. About 1,600 homeless people live in the ACT; because of government and community sector support, more than half have been provided with emergency accommodation and wrap-around support.
Earlier this year, the ACT Council of Social Service (ACTCOSS) noted, ACT homelessness services reported that 43 per cent of service users had experienced homelessness for at least seven months over the last two years. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people had even higher rates of persistent homelessness, at 47 per cent.
“Homelessness is a destabilising and devastating experience for any Canberran to go through,” Ms Vassarotti said. “We know that it has life-long impacts and ongoing costs if people are not provided with rapid and appropriate assistance.
“Amid the worst housing crisis we’ve seen in generations, specialist homelessness services are on the front line, ensuring that people have somewhere safe to sleep and can access a decent home. We know there are more people in need than ever before, and the complexity of need is increasing. We need to ensure these services have the funding and support they need to respond to Canberrans who need our help.”
The package provides support for homelessness services established during the pandemic that provide emergency accommodation and wrap-around support, Ms Vassarotti said. It lifts the base of the homelessness services sector, building on investments in previous budgets (the first significant investment in more than a decade). It provides immediate support to continue crisis accommodation for people sleeping rough; more funding for food services; and more training for front line services.
The package includes:
- $14.3 million over four years to increase the capacity of homelessness services providers
- $2.3 million over two years for Ainslie Lodge, MacKillop House, Axial Housing, and the Early Morning Centre to meet a continued increase in demand
Early Morning Centre is a lifesaver for homeless Canberrans (14 September 2022)
- $1.7 million to fund the Rough Sleeper Program and Complex Client program, and fund the Client Support Fund
ACT Shelter, a housing policy advocacy organisation, welcomed these announcements. “We know it takes a secure home of decent quality at a price you can afford to end homelessness,” CEO Travis Gilbert said. Axial, MacKillop House, and the Rough Sleeper Program “provide pathways to secure, supportive housing for people who, in worst case scenarios, do not survive Canberra winters in cars and on the streets”.
“In an affluent city like Canberra, it should never be acceptable to have a small number of fellow Canberrans die 25 years before their stably housed peers. That’s why Housing First measures are worth the upfront investment, because permanent, supportive housing is critical health and social infrastructure that supports people to avoid preventable death from respiratory and other exposure-related chronic illnesses.”
- $1.2 million for hotel brokerage (crisis accommodation for people sleeping rough) coordinated by OneLink and the Domestic Violence Crisis Service
Mr Gilbert welcomed ongoing brokerage. “It saves lives,” he said. “The ability to access accommodation immediately is [important] to survivor safety.”
- $389,000 to increase the capacity of food services
Mohammed Ali, president of food relief charity HelpingACT, said: “It gives me great pleasure to see that the ACT Government is giving some additional funding to address the current dire situation in the ACT, including food provision to Canberra’s vulnerable…”
He welcomed both the $17. million for the Rough Sleeper and Complex Client programs, and the $389,000 for food services.
- HelpingACT fundraising dinner to help Canberrans in need (10 June)
- People helping people: the team feeding Canberra’s hungry in 2023 (30 January)
“However, given the increasing demand, we need more funding in this sector,” Mr Ali said. “The demand for food has easily more than doubled throughout Canberra.
“In addition, I will be interested to see the criteria to disperse this additional funding for food. It is necessary that street pantries are not forgotten when distributing. HelpingACT and all street pantries are really under the pump at the moment, and we look forward to having a share in this grant.”
- $256,000 for sector development and training
“[The package] demonstrates our real commitment to our community partners who are on the front line of supporting people who are most in need,” Ms Vassarotti said.
By the start of this year, the ACT government had spent more than $9 million this financial year on homelessness, and $15.5 million since 2020 to establish new emergency accommodation and support services for people in need. It provided an extra $2.6 million in January to continue crisis accommodation and support services for Canberrans at risk of or experiencing homelessness, including people with high and complex needs and those escaping domestic and family violence, until the end of the financial year.
Canberra Liberals: “A government forced to spend more money to fix a problem they created”
The Canberra Liberals, however, thought that the government’s own policies had contributed to homelessness.
“It should be no great surprise to anyone that this government, which continues to institute policies that exacerbate the housing crisis, needs to spend more and more money on homelessness services,” Mark Parton MLA, shadow minister for housing and homelessness, said.
“It’s a given that dysfunction in the ACT’s public housing system, continual changes to residential tenancies laws, and an inability to embrace community housing solutions will lead to more pressure on homelessness services.”
Mr Parton has argued that long-term land release policy artificially inflated the cost of all forms of housing across Canberra; that spiralling rates and land tax increase rates for tenants; and that continual changes to residential tenancy legislation force more and more landlords out of the markets, while those who stay must pay thousands of dollars in new maintenance requirements, that further increase rates for tenants – resulting in a city that is unaffordable for basic wage earners and for those on welfare.
He also believes that the ACT government is choking land supply: thousands of Canberrans compete for a couple of hundred blocks at land ballots.
Similarly, Australian Government Productivity Commission’s Report on Government Services data found that the ACT government was spending more on homelessness than ever before, but less on social housing; and homelessness worsened while the number of public housing dwellings fell.
- Canberrans being left behind with broken promises, again (28 February)
- Opinion: Flawed Labor / Greens policy caused ACT housing crisis (28 April)
- Canberra Liberals call for lower rental prices and more land (8 June)
“I refuse to celebrate or commend a government which is forced to spend more and more money trying to fix a problem that they created in the first place,” Mr Parton said.
ACTCOSS
The ACT Council of Social Service welcomed the additional funding for homelessness services.
“With the highest rate of persistent homelessness in the country, the improved funding of ACT homelessness services will enable sustainable service delivery to community members requiring crisis accommodation and support,” Dr Devin Bowles, ACTCOSS CEO, said.
“Accessibility of fully resourced specialist homelessness services is of key concern in delivering on community safety, wellbeing, and equity outcomes.
“We hope to see continued commitment to this positive direction so that the ACT government can continue to proactively address the projected increases to homelessness in the region.”
