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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 9 Hansard (28 August) . . Page.. 2683 ..

MS TUCKER: If you just thought about the intent of the motion, you would not waste everyone's time by arguing about this. If you really thought that was the only reason you did not like this motion, you could amend it and word it better.

It is obvious that we need to have housing in favour of the poorest tenants. They need to have the best access to services, jobs and transport. In particular, the current geographical mix should be maintained. We heard the argument that distribution should be integrated and fair. Suddenly, we have the principle of fairness applied in an arbitrary manner that totally disregards the needs of the poorer people in our community. It is not so easy being a single parent with no car and living in an outer suburb in a city where public transport is decreasing in its efficiency daily. How can you possibly argue that there is a reason to have fair distribution without regarding, or having concern for, the needs of the poorer people in our community? There is a great concern among public housing tenants that the stock in the inner suburbs will be sold off and people will be shipped to the outer suburbs. It is transparent. This is about selling public housing in high-value areas, not about a community mix.

Paragraph (3) is very important, in particular, security of tenure. This is something that is always very important for public housing. The experience of a tenant in a private house - and you can go and talk to the tenants advice union if you are not aware of it because you all happen to own your homes - can be hell. You can have agents hassling you and harassing you. You cannot have any sense of stability in private accommodation. Often you do not have the ability to live in the manner you feel you should live in - and I am not talking about destroying property. Mr Stefaniak has made many complaints about those few tenants who disrespect the property. Most people do not do that, but in private rental accommodation agents are not well known for their acceptance of slightly different lifestyles. (Extension of time granted)

MR SPEAKER: Ms Tucker, before you finish your comments, I would ask you to move amendment No. 1.

MS TUCKER: I move:

Paragraph (1), omit "and the home purchase programs".

I will speak to the amendment. The money from public housing should help the poorest people, and that is why the Greens are moving to remove the reference to home purchase programs. While of course we recognise that home purchase programs are very important, we believe that the money from the proceeds of public housing should be used to help the poorest people find accommodation as a priority.

I could speak also on my further amendment, if that is acceptable. That amendment is about quarantining funds in the future. I think this Assembly should say that targeting the housing budget again to fill the black hole that seems to keep growing as long as the coalition wants to keep cutting is not on. If housing is going to be targeted this year, then we are arguing that it should not be targeted in future years. We will not be supporting the amendment that Mr Berry has put forward on this, because we believe that that has already been decided. This motion is about protecting housing in the next two years at least, so that it does not get slugged twice.

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