Page 1197 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 24 June 1992
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How can the demand for assistance be controlled so that it does not outstrip the funds available? What sort of structure would have to be established to police the system, and how would control be exercised over what people in the private sector choose as their homes? Would we, for example, have to have public servants tied up checking accommodation against a criterion of need for the number of bedrooms, house size and other considerations before the applicant for assistance could sign a lease? I feel that there would be long-term budgetary implications for any such arrangements, both in the short and medium term. Furthermore, the assumption underlying this proposal is that the marketplace will provide an adequate and appropriate level of stock in the right place and at the right time to meet the demand. This assumption is invalid. The marketplace cannot provide a perfect product. Invariably, it is the low income and disadvantaged households that miss out, and this is why we need a strong commitment to public housing. The answer is not to raid the public housing kitty but to provide more funds for housing assistance. The reality is that the demand for housing assistance is greater than the current supply.
The Commonwealth-State Housing Agreement was struck in 1945, immediately after the war, with the main aim of overcoming housing shortages and assisting low and moderate income households. It has been renegotiated on several occasions, most recently in 1989, and has served this country well in terms of providing well-targeted assistance to housing needs. This current agreement, according to the Australian Council of Social Service, National Shelter, the ACT Council of Social Service and many other community organisations, has been the most successful in regard to the outcomes for low to moderate income earners. The agreement was renegotiated in 1989 with the intent of improving the financing arrangements under the agreement and introducing new joint planning and user rights provisions.
The 1989 national housing policy review found that most States were not meeting their matching arrangements with real funds, but using loans instead. Under these circumstances, the States were using Commonwealth-State housing assistance funds to repay loans and were not building on purchasing new public housing stock. The 1989 agreement provides all grant funds for housing assistance, primarily for public rental housing, and is a long-term strategy for meeting the housing needs of low to moderate income households in Australia, including the ACT. The agreement also includes provisions for a joint Commonwealth-State planning process, and provisions to improve the rights of all applicants and recipients of assistance under the agreement to have decisions affecting them reviewed. This renegotiation in 1989 was a recognition that, although the States have been provided with specific funding for housing since 1945, not all States were living up to that responsibility. How, then, can the Federal Government now talk about walking away from this agreement in part or in whole?
The housing programs outlined by Mr Moore - public housing, crisis accommodation and cooperative housing, mortgage relief, Aboriginal housing, youth housing, rooming houses, estate improvements, and local government and community housing - may not have anywhere near the priority assigned to them by the Commonwealth in the different States and Territories. It has been the failure of State governments to implement new forms of public housing and their lack of urgency in addressing the problems of crisis, youth and alternative housing needs that has led to the modification of the agreement over time. The
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