THREE million Australians are now at risk of homelessness, reflecting a 63% surge since 2016, with homelessness services overwhelmed and increasingly having to turn people away.
According to a new report from Impact Economics, Call Unanswered, which surveyed 23 specialist homelessness services over September this year, 83% of services report to being unable to answer calls at times.
This as 74% report to being unable to respond to urgent emails and 40% of services are forced to close their doors during operating hours.
Of the days surveyed one in five saw families with children turned away and one in two saw individuals without dependents turned away.
“Demand for homelessness services has erupted and the system is so under-resourced that people who are homeless can’t get in front of a worker who can help them,” said Kate Colvin, CEO at Homelessness Australia.
“With more than three million Australians now at risk of homelessness, services are forced to close their doors, leave calls unanswered, and turn away families with children on one in five days. People who could have afforded private rentals just a few years ago are now resorting to couch surfing, sleeping in cars or pitching a tent.”
Over the two-week period, services couldn’t answer phones for 325 hours or one in every 13 operating hours and 666 urgent emails went unanswered.
While front doors were closed for 200.5 hours or one in every 22 operating hours.
“Homelessness services simply don’t have the staff to stretch to everyone needing help, and have to go on ‘by-pass’, and triage support to people each day,” added Colvin.
“This means opportunities to help people avoid homelessness are missed; and people go longer without support or miss out entirely, making the path out of homelessness longer, more brutal and less likely to succeed.”
The housing crisis has left many Australians out of options, with the number of people experiencing rental stress increasing by 17.9% since the 2021 census.
This as a recent AHURI report, found renting and lifelong renters are on the rise in all capital cities and across almost all age brackets. Stretched affordability on the back of a house price surge in recent years means that almost 60% of current renters are confident that they’ll own a home in their lifetime.
In Victoria, almost one million people are now at risk of homelessness, up 67% to 987,000 from 2016.
Across the state, homelessness services are feeling the pressure, with 29% forced to close their doors.
This comes after a 23.1% increase in households experiencing rental stress over the state since 2021, or 27.2% in Melbourne alone.
“Almost one million Victorians are now at risk of homelessness – a shocking rise that has unleashed a tidal wave on services. This will mean terrible consequences for women with children trying to escape domestic violence,” said Deborah Di Natale, CEO at Council to Homeless Persons.
“Under-resourced services simply can’t go on like this, with people falling through ever-widening cracks as the worst rental crisis in living memory worsens. We have heard from services directly that it is breaking their hearts to turn people away. Everybody deserves a home.”
While Victoria continues to see the most people at risk of homelessness, Queensland has seen the greatest increase, with an 80% change since 2016.
In NSW, there was a 64% increase in people at risk of homelessness, increasing 271,241 to 696,442 since 2016.
This as the number of people in rental stress was up 14.2% across NSW and 18% in Greater Sydney.
“NSW’s housing crisis is fast becoming a catastrophe. This is a total economic and social failure and completely unacceptable in a state as wealthy and prosperous as NSW.” said Dominique Rowe, CEO at Homelessness NSW.
“The enormous surge in demand for homelessness services across the state has pushed them to breaking point. The NSW and Federal governments must step up and provide extra funding to fix this tragedy.”
Homelessness NSW is calling for a funding increase of at least 20% from the state government.
WA saw a 77% increase in people at risk or homelessness, after a 23.1% increase in rental stress.
With SA seeing a 32% increase in those at risk, Tasmania was up 25% and the Northern territory 7%.
In Contrast, the ACT alone saw a decrease in population at risk, dropping 34% despite a 31.3% increase in rental stress.
