Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Small Business) Share this | Hansard source

I want to thank the member for Canberra for her important question because I know that she, like everyone in this place I'm sure, finds it unacceptable that 123,000 Australians were homeless on census night in 2021.

Each of those Australians has a story to tell, and each story is one that all of us should be listening to. Over 80 per cent of the increase in people who are homelessness are women. And I want to remind members in this place and the other place that that's why, in its first five years, returns from the Housing Australia Future Fund will deliver 4,000 homes for women and children impacted by family and domestic violence and for older women at risk of homelessness, as well as $100 million for crisis and transitional housing options for these people. Sadly the data also showed that Indigenous Australians are over nine times more likely to experience homelessness. That's why returns from our Housing Australia Future Fund will provide $200 million for repairs, maintenance and improvements for housing in remote Indigenous communities.

As the Minister for Veterans' Affairs said yesterday, in the census there was a new question to gauge the number of veterans and serving members of the Australian Defence Force who are homeless.

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