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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2001 Week 5 Hansard (3 May) . . Page.. 1472 ..

MR WOOD (continuing):

25 older persons units, maybe some more. But I think that is looking a bit dicey. Mawson Gardens has gone from 54 to zero. From a total of 794 units just in the larger complexes it has gone down to under 100. That is one area.

I acknowledge that, while these areas are being sold, others are being purchased. Spot purchases are going on all the time, but the figures I gave you just before this indicated that the purchases nowhere near match the sales. So we have a very significant net decline in housing, and people out there are feeling it.

There is nothing for low income people in the private market. There is just nothing there. It is too expensive and it is very tight. I saw the other day that the vacancy rate was 1.6 per cent. It was zero not so long ago. I am not even sure about that 1.6 per cent, but that is too low by anybody's standard. There is no competition out there in the private sector, so rents are quite high. They are as high in Canberra as anywhere around Australia except some parts of Sydney. So the low income earners are removed from that market. They have to have government housing, and in a period of decline that is not easy.

Mr Moore, in his answer to me, says that the waiting list has come down. Was that the briefing you gave Mr Humphries? If you look at what the waiting list was, however it was set up, and what it is now, however it is set up, I do not argue the point. But that is no use to anybody-like the lady I was talking to about half an hour ago who has not got a roof over her head. She is relying-

Mr Humphries: There will always be such cases, though.

MR WOOD: Our aim should be none. Through circumstances entirely beyond her control-

Mr Humphries: They always are.

MR WOOD: Not always. I have to tell you, Mr Humphries, that a lot of the people who come to my office who are in difficult circumstances darn well put themselves there. Some people have a great capacity to make a mess of things-you won't dispute that-but I also get a very large number who are in difficulty through no fault of their own. This lady was effectively kicked out of her house. Her husband changed all the locks, and out she went. She is bedded down in her sister's house at the moment. That is a crowded house, a small unit. These are real difficulties. When I hear, "There will always be someone in strife," my aim is to try to find something for them.

I have to say-I will give you credit here-that I find Housing generally very sympathetic and helpful. When there is a genuine case they are most helpful; there is no question about that. I have said it at estimates, and I have said it a number of times. But at the present moment this lady has no house, and while she has got no house she cannot get custody of her child. You tell me about that. But with the cooperation of ACT Housing, Mr Moore, I think we can find a solution to this.

Let us make it clear that there is a problem of people unable to find a roof over their heads. I understand the difficulties: there are a lot of government houses in Canberra that are very badly run down. I have seen some. It is not the government's fault; it is not the

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