Tanya Plibersek (Sydney, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Housing) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—I would like to update the House on the Australian government’s progress on reducing homelessness. On the best available evidence, on census night 2006 more than 105,000 Australians had no home to go to, and more than 16,000 of those were sleeping rough. That represents 53 people for every 10,000 in the Australian community. It includes people like Alison Meppom and her three children, Rachael, Fletcher and Levon. After leaving domestic violence, Alison and her kids found themselves homeless. As Alison said: ‘It’s hard to explain to people what it feels like to have three young kids and no home, no anchor. There’s such a sense of hopelessness, no money, nowhere to go.’ Luckily, with the support of the Australian government’s A Place to Call Home program and Mission Australia’s help, Alison and her family were able to be housed permanently. Alison said that when she told the kids her daughter said, ‘Mum, I don’t care if it doesn’t have any curtains or windows, it’s going to be our home.’ Alison said, ‘It was like I’d told them we were going to Dream World. They were so happy!’ It is stories like Alison’s that have driven the Australian government’s long term plan to reduce homelessness in Australia.

In February 2008, soon after taking office, we announced that our first white paper process would be on the issue of homelessness. In May last year we released a green paper to begin discussions with the broader Australian community on how we might tackle this challenge. In December 2008, the Prime Minister and I were proud to launch the white paper The Road Home. In the white paper we agreed to two long term goals. We aim to:

• halve homelessness by 2020, and
• provide shelter for those rough sleepers who want it by 2020.

These goals are ambitious but achievable.

Other countries which have sought to reduce homelessness have focused their efforts on rough sleepers and people who are chronically homeless. Australia’s commitment goes further—we are also assisting those people who are marginally housed and living in insecure accommodation. Our commitment is the most comprehensive commitment to tackling homelessness made by any nation. Our goals are backed by a bold and coherent strategy, with substantial reform to programs that assist homeless Australians and new specialist accommodation. It is backed by record additional investment in homelessness services and in new social housing homes.

I am pleased to report to the House that last Friday the Prime Minister’s Council on Homelessness held its first meeting. The council is being chaired by Tony Nicholson, the Executive Director of the Brotherhood of St Laurence, who led our work on the white paper. The other seven members of the council, like Mr Nicholson, are formidable and accomplished advocates for disadvantaged Australians. Individually and collectively, they bring an unrivalled wealth of insight and experience to the government’s homelessness reform agenda. On Friday, the council confirmed its forward plan to provide the government with independent advice on the progress, the risks and emerging issues as we implement our white paper on homelessness.

I am also pleased to report that I have now agreed to implementation plans with all the states and the ACT under the national partnership on homelessness. I hope to finalise arrangements with the Northern Territory shortly. Under this partnership, the Australian government will provide $550 million over five years, to be matched by the states and territories, to deliver a new range of services to meet our white paper goals. This total of $1.1 billion of new funding for homelessness services and specialist accommodation allows us to take a new approach to homelessness. This new approach focuses on preventing homelessness wherever possible, on reducing the duration and impact of homelessness, and on ending homelessness permanently—not just alleviating it temporarily.

We find homeless Australians in cities and towns across our nation, but homelessness has many faces: children escaping domestic violence with their mums in our suburbs; families who can’t pay the rent; chronically homeless older men and women; Indigenous Australians. The different faces of homelessness require different supports, and our approach has been to work with states and territories to find the approaches that work best for their populations. The implementation plans are detailed documents that will evolve over time as we learn more about the most successful ways of preventing and responding to homelessness.

For the benefit of the House, and by way of example, I would like to mention just a few of the reform initiatives contained in the implementation plans. In New South Wales, over 200 more women and children experiencing domestic and family violence will get help to stabilise their housing in the Illawarra, Western Sydney and Hunter areas through rental subsidies and access to long-term accommodation and support. Some 600 people will get help through rental bonds and advanced rent payments from Rentstart to access the private rental market, and up to 700 people in the Richmond-Tweed and mid-North Coast areas will be helped to maintain their tenancies, avoiding eviction and the need to use crisis accommodation.

In Victoria, a new Common Ground facility—innovative accommodation and support—will be developed in the Melbourne CBD, providing 118 long-term homes for people who are homeless or on very low incomes. Intensive psychosocial support packages will be provided for 50 people with mental illnesses to help them stabilise their lives and prevent recurrence of homelessness. New housing support workers will be located at major Victorian prisons to help prisoners transition to stable housing on release. Each year a total of 500 children under 12 in Victoria will get help to stay in school and overcome the trauma of homelessness.

In Queensland, 30 new bungalows will be provided in the backyards of family or caregivers’ homes to house young people at risk of homelessness. The bungalows will be built in backyards in Townsville, Rockhampton, Toowoomba, Inala, Mount Isa and Hervey Bay. A new Common Ground facility will be developed in inner-city Brisbane for 150 people, 75 of whom will be people who were homeless. Up to 1,200 vulnerable families and single people will be helped each year to maintain their tenancies through early interventions and post-crisis support.

In South Australia, a new 40-unit Common Ground complex will be built in Port Augusta for Aboriginal people who are homeless. South Australia will also build three new homes for young people aged between 12 and 15. For these young people there will be a focus on reunification with their families. A new legal and financial clinic for homeless people will provide free legal advice for some 250 people each year. Also in South Australia, 48 homes will be built for frail and aged people who are homeless or at risk of homelessness.

In Western Australia more long-term stable accommodation with support will be provided in inner-city Perth for people who have been sleeping rough. Three new outreach teams supported by specialist mobile clinical units for mental health, drug and alcohol assessment, treatment and referral, will provide intensive help, including access to stable accommodation for rough sleepers in Perth and Fremantle. Eight specialist housing workers will help people leaving mental health services to find and maintain stable housing; five housing workers will give similar help for people leaving correctional facilities. Women and children experiencing domestic and family violence will get help to stay in their own homes, where it is safe for them to do so.

In Tasmania, five new facilities for homeless people will be built over the next two years. Two will be located in Hobart, two in Launceston and one in Devonport. In the ACT, accommodation and support will be available for young people aged 16 to 25 to maintain stable housing, keep up their schooling and help them find a job. Twenty houses and support will be provided over four years under A Place to Call Home for families who would otherwise be homeless. An integrated package of housing and mental health support will be provided for people with moderate to severe mental health issues.

States and territories will report annually against the agreed performance indicators in the homelessness agreement to ensure they remain on track to achieve on their agreed targets.

Of course, we will not be able to reduce homelessness unless we build more houses for people who are homeless or at risk of homelessness. This must include extra affordable public and community housing as well as specialist accommodation delivered together with targeted services to support people, once housed, to stay housed. The Australian government’s new building program will include additional housing stock for people who are at risk of homelessness as well as specialist targeted accommodation for rough sleepers.

Over the next four years the Australian government will deliver an additional 80,000 social and affordable dwellings—over 30,000 of those will be in public and community housing and 50,000 affordable rentals through the National Rental Affordability Scheme. Under the Nation Building Economic Stimulus Plan approvals have already been given to build 10,370 new homes across the country. By the end of last month, building had begun on more than 1,256 of these homes, with 17 homes already completed—the last of those as I mentioned in question time today. More than 31,000 have been repaired under the repairs and maintenance program, with another 14,000 benefiting from work done to common areas.

We expected to return 2,500 homes previously unfit to live in back into public housing stock through substantial renovations. I am pleased to report to the House that the government has far exceeded this target. We will instead return about 10,600 homes to active use as public housing that have been sitting vacant or soon would have become uninhabitable.

To meet our goals and targets to reduce homelessness we will need to ensure that our policies and programs are based in evidence and are well targeted. We should be able to measure the impact of our efforts and demonstrate their effect on reducing homelessness. We should also be held accountable. That is why, two weeks ago, I announced an $11.4 million four-year homelessness research program. The new Homelessness Research Agenda will underpin the government’s white paper and make sure our work is firmly evidence based. This research agenda will fund innovative research into homelessness—to improve our understanding of the factors that can prevent homelessness; to work out how we best invest in the future needs of children to avoid the long-term economic and social costs of homelessness; to find out what works to improve employment and education outcomes for homeless people.

The government’s response to homelessness links many areas of government endeavour. In January this year the first of four aged-cared facilities was announced with a $3 million grant to Wintringham for the Eunice Seddon Aged Care Home in Dandenong in Victoria. It will house 60 frail aged homeless people. In August the Australian government provided Mission Australia with a $16 million grant to refurbish a home in Redfern in Sydney. This will provide residential aged-care beds for 72 frail aged homeless people.

Many initiatives in other areas of government will work to reduce homelessness. Through Centrelink, the Australian government will employ 90 community contact officers to provide enhanced Centrelink services to people who are at risk of homelessness. The Australian government will also fund more support and assistance for people living with severe mental illness—with the next round of the Personal Helpers and Mentors Program focusing on areas with high rates of homelessness.

The Australian government’s National Plan to Reduce Violence against Women will work to reduce domestic violence related homelessness. The first stage of the National Plan to Reduce Violence against Women is complete with $42 million for a new national telephone and online crisis service and for primary prevention activities, including respectful relationship programs. Through the Council of Australian Governments we will work with the states and territories to develop the final National Plan to Reduce Violence against Women for release in 2010.

The Australian government has also doubled emergency relief funding to around $70 million in 2009-10 and 2010-11. This will provide significant assistance to charities to meet the needs of disadvantaged Australians—many of whom are at risk of homelessness. The Australian government has also agreed with banks to negotiate postponing mortgage payments for up to 12 months for borrowers who have lost their jobs.

The new Job Services Australia framework together with the government’s Innovation Fund and projects announced under the Australian government’s Jobs Fund will deliver better employment outcomes for people who are at risk of homeless.

These significant initiatives will contribute to the broader effort to reduce homelessness and greatly assist us to meet our goals and targets.

The Rudd government’s housing programs represent an unprecedented injection of commitment and funds to tackling homelessness. What I have described to the House today is the down payment on a 12-year reform agenda. The government understand that we will not end homelessness overnight, but we believe that with sustained effort and an ethic of service we can reduce the number of Australians who ever experience homelessness, and better serve those who do, helping them move permanently out of homelessness. I commend this statement to the House.

I ask leave of the House to move a motion to enable the member for Cook to speak for 14 minutes.

Leave granted.

I move:

That so much of the standing and sessional orders be suspended as would prevent Mr Morrison speaking in reply to the ministerial statement for a period not exceeding 14 minutes.

Question agreed to.

Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Housing and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The coalition welcomes the government’s statement on homelessness as delivered by the minister this afternoon. I also place on record my commendation to the minister for her very sincere and dedicated personal commitment on this issue. As I move around those who work in this area I think there is one thing we can very much agree on, which is the minister’s very personal commitment to this issue.

The coalition has taken a very proactive and consistent bipartisan approach on the vast majority of measures that have been discussed today and that have been introduced by the government. We have supported some $3½ billion of initiatives that have been announced by the government in the area of homelessness and in the area of affordable housing and we continue to do so.

Homelessness is a significant challenge. There is no single cause. It is not simply a bricks and mortar issue. The various impacts of family breakdown, substance abuse, domestic violence and sexual abuse all take a very heavy toll. I am very pleased to know that, as was the case with the coalition government, these social issues are being addressed through the many programs that are out there and available.

Our task is to help each of these Australians gain some stability in their lives and give them the opportunity to get their lives back on track. That is the ultimate goal. This requires, I believe, case-by-case, individual-by-individual measures that will enable them to take the next step then the one after and the one after that. That is why in government the coalition focused its additional efforts on early intervention programs such as Reconnect, mentoring programs and other initiatives which the government have taken up and expanded on. We are also particularly pleased that they have had some impact. While there are around 105,000 people who are designated as homeless, in the period 2001-06 we did see the level of homelessness among 18- to 24-year-olds decline by 16 per cent. But I know the minister and I agree that one special and very disturbing concern is the increase in family homelessness that has occurred, particularly evidenced by the incidence of homelessness among young children.

Of course, we now have additional pressures placed on people and homelessness services by the economic downturn. In an earlier discussion I had with the homelessness bodies, I simply said that we do not want, as we move through this economic crisis, more clients for them to have to look after. We should do everything we can to keep people in the homes they have now, because those services are there presently to look after people who are already in that situation and who have been in that situation through periods of prosperity and downturn alike, and who will always need those services. I do not want to see one cent not there for those individuals whom I suspect, sadly, we will always have to assist.

We were quick to support the homelessness package on the occasion it was announced prior to Christmas. In particular the Place to Call Home initiative is very good, as is the National Partnership Agreement on Homelessness. The reason we were supportive of those, particularly the latter one, was that they do have a very heavy focus on early intervention initiatives and we appreciate that. But at this point I suppose I have to depart from where our agreement rests because obviously we were disappointed—as I am sure the minister was as well—that, despite the fact that that agreement was supposed to have all the plans agreed by 31 March, they were not. That was still the case by July, with New South Wales in particular outstanding in accounting for one-quarter of homeless people in Australia. That is a problem.

I sympathise because the failure of states and territories to come to the table on this issue, to agree, to have plans and to put up the money is the problem the government has in making headway on this issue. It is the incompetence of state and territory administrations, particularly in the area of their public housing and other programs. Probably the best evidence of this, as we have seen writ large across our country but particularly in one part of the country, is the shameful failure to deliver on the central commitment of the Northern Territory intervention—the Strategic Indigenous Housing and Infrastructure Program—let alone the commitments made in addition to that initiative.

There was a commitment to build 750 houses for Indigenous Australians. It has collapsed into an abyss, with not a single house built under that program. In September 2007, we should remind ourselves—almost two years ago—the then coalition government signed a memorandum of understanding with the Northern Territory government to deliver these houses and that program. On 12 April last year the new Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs affirmed the Rudd government would contribute $547 million over four years in partnership with $100 million from the Northern Territory government. Since then, virtually every deadline has been missed. In April 2008 the minister said work would begin on the 750 houses by October 2008. Then it was planned for early 2009. In February there were still no new houses in sight, and then silence fell around this program. It was not until work was pledged to start on the Tiwi Islands in May that we heard something. In June this year we heard one construction company say that they will have to build fewer houses ultimately with the available funds due to increased costs.

It was not as if there were not any warnings about this program. In April 2008 there was a warning given by none other than the parliamentary secretary assisting the minister, Senator Ursula Stephens. She delivered a warning to the minister and said that there were problems that needed to be fixed. What kind of problems were they? The problems were that the scheme was flawed, shoddy and open to potential corruption. The unfolding chaos in the program shows that these warnings were ignored. Yet recently the senator told the media that she believed her concerns had been completely addressed by the minister. If this is true, when it comes to closing the gap on Indigenous housing the Rudd government have demonstrated their willingness to simply settle for less. That is unacceptable. It has taken one of Labor’s own, the Northern Territory minister responsible for this program, Alison Anderson, to stand against this settle-for-less attitude. Former Minister Anderson describes the program as:

… the biggest scandal I have seen in my political career.

                  …              …              …

SIHIP was designed as the great answer to the remote housing crisis that is crippling my people. It was the heart and core of the commonwealth’s “emergency response”, after the Little Children are Sacred report was made public. It was the one big chance to change the way things are on communities. We politicians said that we would build the houses that were needed: 750 houses.

Late last year I began to receive briefings about the program. I knew things were going wrong. I raised my concerns with my colleagues. I struggled to get action. I appealed to them. I could see the disaster in the making. I could see the money being swallowed up: on consultation, on training costs, on administration. At meeting after meeting I warned my ministerial colleagues. I did everything I could to resolve this matter inside the party.

I was unsuccessful. There was no urgency. They didn’t care. I came to understand then that they were quite content to just continue administering Aboriginal communities, taking the money from Canberra. It was just business as usual for them.

                  …              …              …

… my Labor colleagues were quite prepared to sweep this disaster under the carpet.

                  …              …              …

The record of waste and chaos is a shame on the government. Here the ministers sit, cool and comfortable, while Aboriginal people live crowded, 20 to a house. It is a disgrace.

Those comments were directed at the Northern Territory government, but it was Commonwealth money. You have to ask the question: where was the Commonwealth when this money was being used in such a shameful way?

Labor’s failure to deliver this program at all levels has trashed the trust of progressive Indigenous leaders in the Northern Territory intervention. Not content with undermining the intervention with their hollow commitments and their moves to restore the permit system and go soft on the availability of pornography, they have now shattered the confidence of those Indigenous leaders who have provided much needed support for this unique opportunity to make progress and to create a different future. I think it is summed up well by Arnhem Land leader Galarrwuy Yunupingu, who was a supporter of the intervention but no longer is. He has withdrawn his support and condemned the Rudd government’s inability to deliver on Aboriginal housing. He has in fact called for an intervention of his own into the incompetence of the housing bureaucracy that has delivered this shameful event.

Social housing, as the minister has also spoken on, was an issue that was chosen for inclusion in the government’s broader economic stimulus initiatives. Once again, the governemnt relied on the states and territories to make sure the delivery of this occurred. As the minister referred to, the government set aside under the partnership agreement some $160,000 per dwelling for repairs and maintenance. The reason that figure was so high is it was supposed to be for substantial repairs and maintenance. To quote the agreement, it was to:

… support the refurbishment of existing social housing dwellings that are not currently suitable for occupation so that they can add to the social housing stock in each jurisdiction.

Yet, before the ink was dry on this agreement, this became in effect a slush fund to redress the failure of states to undertake basic maintenance on their housing stock, with funds being dedicated to minor repairs with an average cost of just $7,500 as opposed to $160,000 for 38,000 homes, and the average cost for the major renovations, as understood, was around $10,600. This is, I have to say, one of the oldest cons in the book from state and territory governments: to cost-shift their failure to do their job back onto the federal government. In this case, they found a very willing partner, and as a result the mismanagement of state and territory housing agencies has been subsidised by the federal taxpayer not just with funds but with borrowed funds.

Then there is the program to build 20,000 new dwellings. Let us recall that it was state governments that managed to spend $4 billion in real terms between 2003 and 2008 on public housing construction. You would think that after spending $4 billion over five years you would have moved forward, but at the end of that period of time there were 10,146 fewer dwellings than when they had started. I do not consider that a great job application to spend another $6 billion of federal taxpayers’ borrowed money. These projects are already falling behind timetable, and the government has refused to agree to provide timely reports on the progress of the scheme, preferring, frankly, to do media opportunities rather than subject the program and delivery of this scheme to parliamentary scrutiny.

More broadly, social housing has been abused as a policy instrument by involvement in the stimulus program. Poor planning and zero consultation when overriding local planning laws betray an attitude of ‘get it done’ rather than ‘get it right’—and in the Northern Territory neither is done. This attitude means that as this program continues we will sow the seeds of social dislocation for decades to come. This is also evident in the government’s NRAS program, which has the temerity to approve projects that fail to comply with local planning laws, such as the Coombabah projects on Queensland’s Gold Coast, where local residents want to know why the federal government has ignored what they want for their community, as expressed and supported in their local planning codes. So much for the views of local residents! Under Labor, we are seeing with the delivery of this program that competitive federalism has indeed become the lowest common denominator of collusive federalism.

I conclude by talking about where the biggest job really is, and that is where 95 per cent of Australians live: the private housing market. The best way for people to keep their home is to keep their job, and we need policies that keep people in their jobs. The Reserve Bank governor last week confirmed that bottlenecks rather than bubbles were responsible for the key housing affordability challenge that we face in this country, and as a result we need to build more private sector homes. Our estimation and those provided by economists around the country are that we need to build in excess of 160,000 every year for the next 10 years. Building just 20,000 in 12 or 18 months is really not going to be the answer to the problem. We need to ensure that the private sector housing market is able to perform at a much higher level in order to address the shortfall, or frankly prices and rents are going to continue to go up. Throwing money around at the states is not going to be the answer. So we need real reform on this issue. I commend the government for their more specific programs on the issues of homelessness—they are worthy initiatives that are supported by the coalition—but I must call them to account on addressing the issues of their failings, particularly in Indigenous housing in the Northern Territory, and addressing the real issues in the private housing market.