Page 2585 - Week 08 - Thursday, 30 June 2005
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committee that housing affordability in those terms of ownership had improved over the past 12 months. The Treasurer wrote to the committee a couple of days later to correct the record and confirm that housing ownership affordability had, in fact, deteriorated over that time.
A spokesperson from Treasury acknowledged that this indicator says nothing about the affordability of privately rented housing. In fact, there has been no decrease in median rents in the ACT and rental costs here are relatively high compared to the rest of Australia—the highest of the capital cities of Australia for housing and the second highest for units—because demand has been very close to supply, leading to a low vacancy rate. There is no evidence that the rental market is easing or that there has been any reduction in the number of people seeking urgent placements in public housing.
If I were a cynical person, I could interpret this to mean that the Treasurer and more broadly the ACT government think of home affordability only as it relates to the cost of buying property. This is a view that would be supported by the fact the Treasurer highlights the first home buyer concession scheme as a major, perhaps the only, measure in this year’s budget to increase housing affordability. Perhaps then we should not be surprised to find that cabinet did not even consider providing additional funding for public housing, despite the election commitment to spend an additional $33 million.
Perhaps it is a lack of concern over housing. Perhaps it is simply a reflection of the priorities of the minister, who “didn’t particularly feel like asking for $62½ million”. He went on to say that he wanted to ask for funding for other initiatives. So, instead of putting forward all the needs recognised within his portfolio, he selected preferred projects and left the rest out. This has resulted in a broken election promise and the prospect of little or no improvement in public housing waiting lists over the next 12 months. Indeed, I note from the budget documents that there will be a net decrease of around 100 in the number of properties managed by ACT Housing over the next 12 months.
Canberra does not have a large number of private or non-government housing suppliers with a focus on affordable housing. The estimates committee hearing heard testimony from community groups, including ACT Shelter, ACTCOSS and the Mental Health Community Coalition, that there is a very serious undersupply of affordable housing in Canberra. This has resulted in long waiting lists for early allocations of public housing and a bottleneck in crisis accommodation services.
The failure to invest in housing perpetuates a range of other social and economic difficulties for people who are experiencing homelessness or housing stress. To quote ACT Shelter’s Kerrie Tucker from the estimates hearing of this year:
… housing is more than just a roof. A secure, affordable and appropriate home is essential for you to deal with all your other issues, and you’re not going to be able to do that if you don’t have secure housing. So you have to see the lack of affordable housing in the broader context.
By the way, I have heard similar comments from members of this government, so Kerrie Tucker is in good company when she makes this comment.
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