Housing affordability and availability is perhaps the biggest cause of homelessness in the ACT; rents are the highest in the country, there is a shortfall of more than 3,000 social housing properties, and nearly 3,000 people are waiting almost four years for a place of their own.
The ACT Government has promised to renew 1,000 public houses and build 400 new ones, in what they call the largest investment in public housing per capita in Australia.
Local community organisations, including ACTCOSS (ACT Council of Social Service) and St Vincent de Paul (Vinnies), have called on the ACT and federal governments to invest in social housing to meet the shortfall and address the housing affordability crisis. They want the ACT Government to mandate that 15% of the Land Release Program Fund should be set aside for public, community, and affordable housing.
Moreover, ACTCOSS’s Geoff Buchanan said, funding must be adequately indexed to keep up with increasing costs of service provision; the ACT Government should fund wrap-around support services for tenants with high and complex needs; and community development to support social inclusion and access to community facilities.
Mark Parton MLA, Shadow Minister for Housing and Homelessness, believes there needs to be a greater role both for community housing providers in the affordable housing space in the ACT and for shared equity schemes, attracting institutional investors to support community housing providers. At the last election, he said, the Liberals’ policies were well received by ACTCOSS, ACT Shelter, YWCA, and other advocacy bodies. Mr Parton moved in February that these measures would ease housing stress, but the government negatived them, arguing they already had a similar approach.
Earlier this year, the ACT Government indefinitely extended land tax exemptions for landlords who rent their properties at less than 75% market rates through a registered community housing provider. Andrew Hannan, CEO of CHC: Homes for the Community, described as the largest provider of affordable and social housing based in Canberra, suggests the government could give more incentives to landlords who list their homes at below-market rates.
To meet its target of 600 more affordable rental properties over five years, the ACT Government could invest $12 to $18 million per year, much of this as revenue foregone (discontinued land, lease variation charge waivers, rates exemption for registered not-for-profit community housing providers) rather than additional costs.
“This would be a least-cost way for the government to make a difference,” he said.
David Pearson, CEO of the Australian Alliance to End Homelessness (AAEH), believes the ACT could be one of the first cities outside North America to end homelessness. Advance to Zero adopts a human approach, treating rough sleepers as individuals; produces data to track progress in successfully housing people; lines up a supply of housing and matches people to services they need; and moves people into housing and supports them to stay housed.
“You can’t change what you don’t measure. If Canberra really wants to end homelessness, it first needs to measure it in real time,” he said.
So far, Mr Pearson said, Advance to Zero has eradicated homelessness in 15 North American communities. The ACT was ideally placed, given its nationally comparatively lower rates of homelessness, but was not part of that campaign yet. However, Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide, and Port Phillip have lists of names and needs of everyone sleeping rough in their communities.
“Every homelessness person has their own unique circumstances, they have their own story and their own needs. We need to get better at meeting those needs if we are to end homelessness. That starts with knowing, by name, every person sleeping rough, and what their needs are.”
Vinnies, during last year’s election, called for the right to adequate housing to be recognised as a basic human right in the ACT Human Rights Act; this would allow the government to address homelessness from a Housing First approach, CEO Barnie van Wyk said.
Federal politics
Since private rental properties are usually unaffordable for people on social security payments, and barely affordable for people on age pension or minimum wage, ACTCOSS want the Federal Government to increase the rate of payments to ensure they are above the poverty line and in line with the cost of living – including the cost of keeping a roof over your head, Mr Buchanan said.
Rebecca Vassarotti, ACT Minister for Homelessness and Housing Services, agreed. “The Federal Government holds a number of policy levers that impact our community and can lock Canberrans in need out of safe and secure homes.”
She believes federal tax settings should prioritise homes as a human right, rather than as a wealth-generating asset.
“Negative gearing and low capital gains taxes encourage over-inflation of the market, which can lock out people at risk of homelessness and create housing insecurity for more Canberrans.”
Rebecca Vassarotti
David Pearson, from the Australian Alliance to End Homelessness, called for the Australian Government to urgently implement a COVID-19 National Rough Sleeping Homelessness Pandemic Response Plan. (This had already been done in response to mental health and domestic violence, but not to homelessness, he said.)
“Ending homelessness is possible in Australia, but not without Federal Government leadership, which we don’t currently have.”
Vinnies wants the government to continue the measures it quickly introduced last year to help homeless people during the pandemic: alternate accommodation options, contactless delivery of food and clothing vouchers, and JobKeeper and JobSeeker packages.
David Smith MP, Labor Member for Bean, said that if Labor won the next election, it would establish the Housing Australia Future Fund, which would build social and affordable housing and help reduce homelessness across Australia. Over the first five years it will:
- Build 20,000 new social housing properties, including 4,000 homes for women and children fleeing domestic and family violence and older women on low incomes who are at risk of homelessness;
- Build 10,000 affordable homes for frontline workers like police, nurses, and cleaners;
- Provide $200 million to repair, maintain, and improve housing in remote Indigenous communities, where First Nations people endure some of the worst housing standards in the world;
- Invest $100 million in crisis and transitional housing for women and children fleeing domestic and family violence, and older women on low incomes who are at risk of homelessness; and
- Invest $30 million to build housing and fund specialist services for veterans who are homeless or at-risk.
After the first five years, Mr Smith said, a portion of the investment returns will be available to fund acute housing needs each year, in perpetuity. This funding will be used for additional crisis housing, transitional housing, and long-term social housing in parts of the country with the greatest need.
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