VICTORIA’S Allan government is being urged to develop at least 6,000 public and community dwellings each year for a decade to combat the housing crisis, while its leasing of properties directly from builders has been endorsed by a key homelessness body.
Council to Homeless Persons (CHP) welcomed the move that was reported in the Herald Sun of Homes Victoria – which oversees public housing – leasing properties to provide additional social housing in the areas of greatest need.
Homes Victoria has been offering five-year fixed term leases to the builders and guaranteed rent increases of 5% per year. The agency has been targeting three-bedroom homes in suburbs including Albion, Ardeer, Braybrook, Brunswick, Carlton North, East Melbourne, Kensington, Maidstone, Maribyrnong and Sunshine.
CHP acting chief executive officer Tom Johnson said the government should be pulling every lever possible to increase social housing stock.
“This action will add to Victoria’s social housing stock at a time when the state is facing its most profound housing crisis in living memory,” he said.
Victoria’s public housing waiting list is now at 61,587, while the proportion of social housing in the state’s total housing stock is the lowest in Australia, at just 2.8%.
“Renting properties and providing them to people experiencing homelessness at affordable prices is real action to support Victorians at the forefront of this crisis,” Johnson said.
“Alongside this, the government should commit to building at least 6,000 public and community dwellings each year for a decade.
“An overwhelming majority of Victorians want more action on this crisis and this move does exactly that.”
Polling undertaken by RedBridge on behalf of the Property Council of Australia one year on from the release of the Housing Statement shows nearly seven in 10 Victorians believe the state government is not doing enough to address the housing crisis
One in five Victorians said their housing situation is currently unstable, which the Property Council said emphasised the need for deeper and immediate action to be taken to address housing supply and affordability, including prioritising housing action over some government mega projects.
The Allan government is pushing ahead with plans to redevelop public housing towers as part of a controversial program it bills as Australia’s “largest-ever renewal project”.
The then-Daniel Andrews-led government announced a last year as part of its Housing Statement it would replace Melbourne’s 44 high-rise housing estates that house around 10,000 people with new towers that would be home to 30,000 residents. Of this, 11,000 would be public tenants, and the balance to be a mixture of social and market housing.
The program is later this month going to a two-day class action trial in the Supreme Court brought by residents.
A report released this week by not-for-profit architecture and research firm OFFICE estimated that the government could save hundreds of millions of dollars by refurbishing and expanding existing towers, rather than completely demolishing and rebuilding them to modern standards..
The report suggested that four 20-storey towers at a 1960s Flemington estate in inner Melbourne could be upgraded internally and externally, with five mid-rise social housing buildings built in and around the towers on car parking space. New car parking would be put under the new buildings.
The state government expects the entire program to cost $2.3 billion over 20 years.
It has signed a $100 million contract with John Holland for demolition of the first lot of towers, in Carlton, Flemington and North Melbourne.
