Page 484 - Week 02 - Thursday, 25 February 1993
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What is meant by the statement that I received recently from the Minister? It stated:
In order for people to register for public housing they must live and/or work in the ACT. As the ACT does not have a jail, ex-prisoners who lived and/or worked in the ACT prior to their imprisonment are deemed to have lived in the ACT during their imprisonment.
Does this mean that, if the ACT did have a gaol, someone who came here to commit a crime and was caught and served a sentence here in the ACT could then apply for trust housing, perhaps even priority housing? I do not know. Does the trust bother to find out why people were gaoled, so that "single applicants who are entitled only to one-bedroom accommodation and will therefore be housed in flat complexes" hopefully takes into account the risk of rapists and child molesters, et cetera, not being accommodated too near temptation?
I think that is a matter of concern to everybody. Why do people tell me that the so-called green form, ostensibly to assess continual eligibility for rebates, is treated as a joke by some people and not even received for completion, even over periods of several years, by others? Why are up-market trust properties rented for ludicrous amounts - like one in Hopetoun Circuit, Yarralumla, at $150 per week? Why are other trust properties leased out to diplomatic embassies, as was said in the Canberra Times this morning? And why are trust properties like Burnie Court, a potentially pleasant environment, being used as a dumping ground for people who cannot be accommodated elsewhere? Bedsitters are damaged and vandalised and, again, tenants live in fear. Again, I suggest that an inquiry would find out.
To conclude, I believe that I have demonstrated sufficient areas of concern in the trust's operations, the evidence for which I remind members has been largely provided by the trust itself in replies to my questions on notice. The trust does not seem to appreciate that it has a responsibility to the Australian taxpayer, to the ACT ratepayer and to all its tenants, rather than to an irresponsible minority, to manage its affairs in a businesslike and firm but fair manner. The Housing Trust's level of outstanding debt, its lack of control of its waiting list and its selective compassion to a minority all would indicate that this is not the case. The Housing Trust has allowed its philosophy to become imbued with an extreme interpretation of the social justice concept which appears to permit all sorts of abuses of the system and of other people to take place in the name of some perverted sense of equality and of equity.
In its quest for social justice for some, the Housing Trust cannot override the social justice expectations of the many. Problem tenants also have responsibilities as well as their much vaunted rights. I am not convinced that the political will exists to create the attitudinal change necessary in the trust to make its administration either efficient, cost-effective or even-handedly compassionate. I also believe that there are many unanswered questions about the operations of the ACT Housing Trust that need to be addressed. I would hope that I have demonstrated enough of these concerns to seek and to obtain the support of the Assembly for a public inquiry into the operations of the ACT Housing Trust by the Assembly's Social Policy Committee.
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