Page 2108 - Week 07 - Thursday, 16 June 1994
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Later -
we do not know how much later; 12 months later, perhaps, like the men's shelter -
the Housing Trust will be able to provide point of contact services which will avoid the need for clients to follow up their applications and requests.
I do not believe you. Most of the callers to my office in relation to Housing Trust matters complain that nobody ever answers their calls, or, if they do call in, nobody ever phones back. I wish you luck, Mr Lamont; but I suggest that you will have no better luck than your predecessor, Mr Connolly. Mr Lamont, perhaps, is upstairs checking over what he said in the budget.
Mr Kaine: He is trying to find the Tuggeranong oval.
MR CORNWELL: Indeed, the Tuggeranong oval. He went on to say that our Housing Trust tenants "will be advised, for example, what action will be taken to repair their homes when they notify their district office". I think the answer is very simple, certainly from my experience - nothing. The answer will be, "We will get back to you. We are from the Government. We are here to help you".
Mr De Domenico: "Trust me; I am a Labor politician".
MR CORNWELL: That is correct. "Trust me; I am a Labor politician". What we have come down to, again, is simply a whole heap of empty rhetoric. They trot out the old business, such as that they are going to improve things by direct debit payments. This furphy has been tossed around for about three years. We all know that direct debit will fail because it can be done only on a voluntary basis. On a voluntary direct debit basis, you do not need to chase up people, for the simple reason that they are the people who pay their rent anyway. It is the people who do not whom you have to chase up.
Most of the problems that are faced by the trust could very easily be corrected by regular three-monthly inspections of properties, by a determined effort to make rent collections mandatory through direct debit, and, in the Housing Trust flats, by putting janitors back and giving people a bit of security. Instead, we have this furphy coming out again - promises, promises, promises - that you are looking at another review of housing. In the meantime we sit on $5.5m worth of arrears, $2.5m of which are by people who are vacating. We have an underspending of $9m this year and we have the Auditor-General's report which shows that, in maintenance expenditure, each public housing residence in the ACT costs, on average, $1,222 compared with an average in other States of $824. We also have what has to be the understatement of the year - that the success rate in recovering from tenants the cost of repairs for which they were responsible was low in 1992-93. Low! It was virtually invisible. We got back 4.1 per cent. The amount invoiced was $80,000 and the trust managed to collect $3,258, or 4.1 per cent. "Low", says the Auditor-General. That, as I say, has to be the understatement of the year.
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