During Homelessness Week and every week, more than 120,000 people are homeless across Australia. That includes people sleeping rough but also people living in cars, couch surfing, or crammed into overcrowded housing. The number is growing fast. Homelessness has jumped by 6,000 people in just five years.
It’s tempting to think of homelessness as a fringe issue. But with rents skyrocketing and vacancy rates at record lows, more and more people are finding themselves at risk.
Community workers on the frontline are seeing families sleeping in tents and single mothers turned away from refuge services. People who’ve never needed help before are lining up for food relief because their rent has swallowed their whole pay cheque. Others are trapped in unsafe situations, staying with violent partners because they can’t find anywhere else to go.
This is the sharp end of the housing crisis. The only real way to end it is to build homes that people can actually afford to rent.
That shouldn’t be a radical idea. Australia used build around 30,000 public and community homes every year. Those homes housed working people, driving affordability across the rental market.
Today, that legacy has been squandered. Social housing has fallen to just four per cent of all housing stock, and waitlists are blowing out across the country.
As governments have walked away from building homes, they have outsourced the housing crisis to the rest of us. To struggling renters forced to pay half their income just to keep a roof over their heads. To overstretched community services left to pick up the pieces. And to charities who are now running housing lotteries, deciding which family sleeps in a safe bed and which is turned away.
Australia is one of the wealthiest countries in the world. We shouldn’t be rationing housing. And we shouldn’t accept a system that treats homelessness as a fact of life.
The solutions are simple. We need the Federal Government to take responsibility and lead a national effort to build the homes we need. That means building at least 25,000 social and affordable homes a year. And it means phasing out the billions we spend on tax handouts for investors, so that money can go where it’s needed most.
There’s no reason this can’t be done. The only thing missing is political will. And with housing and homelessness now ranked as the top concern for Australians, the message to governments is clear.
It’s time to stop the cuts and short-term crisis responses. It’s time to build our way out of this crisis. And it’s time to treat housing as a right, not a privilege.
Maiy Azize is Deputy Director of Anglicare Australia and Everybody’s Home Spokesperson