homelessness

New "Teal" politician and economic growthist, Allegra Spender, promotes immigration rates of 220,000 p.a.

Lord Mayor Clover Moore has nothing to congratulate herself on with regard to homelessness in Sydney. The City of Sydney’s most recent street count has revealed that homelessness has risen and crisis shelters are at capacity.

Referring to the HILDA Report, the author suggests that, if immigration were reduced, a precipitate decline in house-prices could probably be adequately buffered by local buyers who currently cannot afford to enter the grossly inflated housing market.

At first glance The Australian Greens’ announcement that they would abolish the negative gearing ₁  tax break, in a bid to increase government revenue through increased taxation and improve homelessness and housing affordability looks like the right move. I have, however a few questions about this.

ACOSS has come to the amazing and unprecedented conclusion that for "an increasing number of Australians, housing affordability is a serious problem that affects their ability to work". A quarter of people battling with housing stress regularly skip meals in order to pay their rent.

"There's a lot of overcrowding, people are bunking up, living in inappropriate forms of housing which are not good for anybody," chief executive of the Australian Council of Social Service Dr Goldie said. (Article republished from comment to front page article.)

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Meeting 27 Nov., 2014, Seaford Community Centre, 6.30 –
8.00 pm Car parks over Community? Seaford Cabin Park houses marginalised people in around 80 units between Nepean Highway and Kananook Creek. Council plans will see people evicted from 20 of these units and possibly the closure of the entire cabin park.

The Cabin Parks sits in part on Crown land which it has leased from the Council for over 20 years. Council now wants to terminate that lease so as to create a car park. This will lead to the loss of around 20 cabins, meaning that the residents of those cabins will be displaced. The loss of the lease may even affect the viability of the entire cabin park, meaning all residents would need to find alternative accommodation.

There is very little 'social housing' available around Frankston and the Mornington Peninsula, yet Council has suggested these people could be relocated to Mornington - in an entirely different community! Assuming that such accommodation can even be found - there or anywhere else. Despite no clear justification for a car park, Council is stubbornly insisting on continuing with the eviction.

In 2013 foreign investors obtained permission from the Victorian government to build or to buy 4,500 houses, amounting to some $18b worth of approvals. Numbers of houses falling into foreign hands are increasing, with the Chinese the biggest buyers and builders, followed by the Canadians, Americans and Singaporeans. There were 12,025 applications to invest in Victorian real estate according to an annual report for 2012-2013. Not one was rejected. On Wednesday 19 March 2014 the Treasurer, The Hon Joe Hockey MP, asked the Economics Committee to inquire into and report on Australia's foreign investment policy as it applies to residential real estate.

Although the date for submissions seems to have passed, the committee is still receiving them. Since most submissions have come from professional organisations with a financial interest in promoting more houses, there is a great need for members of the public who cannot afford housing to make submissions. Submissions

Low income households are becoming increasingly marginalised and excluded from opportunities. More than one third of households privately renting who access Anglicare Emergency Relief are in severe rental stress, spending more than 45% of their income in rent. The Federal government intends to fund only 1,000 new homes under the National Rental Affordability Scheme, against the real need of at least 89,000 dwellings in NSW.

Jon Faine surprised many Victorians yesterday morning (4 September 2012) when he lambasted the abuse of 457 Visas in Victoria at a time of high local unemployment. He drew listeners' attention robustly to the folly of importing thousands of workers to industries where Australians could not even afford to train.

Back on May 17th, 2010 I wrote an article on CanDoBetter entitled 'Australia's growing underclass'.

Two weeks out from a federal election and the range and depth and vision on the two major parties - the LibLabs is woefully simplistic and shortsighted.

Illustration: collage of icons from housing and immigration industry sites and Steve Vizard who marketed the Bracks Melbourne Population Summit in 2002
Article by Jonathan Page