Josh Burns (Macnamara, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That this House:

(1) notes that:

(a) the week of 1 to 7 August 2022 is National Homelessness Week, with the theme of 'To end homelessness we need a plan';

(b) National Homelessness Week aims to raise awareness of the impact of homelessness in Australia via national and local community events, including providing information on the importance of housing as a solution and educating communities on how they can make a difference;

(c) sadly, there were 116,427 people homeless on census night in 2016; and

(d) access to secure and affordable housing has significant social, economic and personal benefits; and

(2) acknowledges that the Government has committed to a reform agenda to address the challenges of homelessness including:

(a) establishing a $10 billion Housing Australia Future Fund which will:

(i) build 30,000 social and affordable housing properties in its first five years;

(ii) provide $200 million for the repair, maintenance and improvements of housing in remote Indigenous communities;

(iii) fund $100 million for crisis and transitional housing options for women and children fleeing domestic and family violence and older women on low incomes who are at risk of homelessness; and

(iv) build more housing and fund specialist services for veterans who are experiencing homelessness or at-risk homelessness;

(b) introducing the National Housing Supply and Affordability Council to ensure the Commonwealth plays a leadership role in increasing housing supply and improving housing affordability; and

(c) developing a new national housing and homelessness plan with the support and assistance of key stakeholders.

This is an important motion, and I want to start my remarks by thanking the member for Boothby for agreeing to second this motion. The member for Boothby has spent decades on the front lines in not-for-profits looking after the needs of her community, and I know she will continue to do that and will make a huge contribution in this role and in this place, while always holding the experiences that she had on the front lines to guide her policy contributions on issues such as this.

It is astonishing that in Australia we still have thousands and thousands of Australians living without a secure and safe source of housing. In this National Homelessness Week, the theme is 'To end homelessness we need a plan', and a plan is exactly what this government has got. It is a plan that will continue to be built and developed and worked on during our time in government. It is significant that, for the first time in almost a decade, the federal government is willing to invest in social and affordable housing. Unfortunately, the political trend in Australia is that—

Hon. Members:

Honourable members interjecting—

Josh Burns (Macnamara, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I can hear some interjections, and I'm happy to go through a little bit of history for those interjecting. I note the member for Deakin is in the building here. He is someone who tried to fob off affordable and social housing to the states, something that we're not going to be doing. We're going to make sure that we're investing directly in affordable and social housing. But I will let the member for Deakin go through all the things that he didn't do while he was in government.

More importantly, on National Homelessness Week, we, the federal government, are going to start investing back into social and affordable housing. Curtin and Chifley, following World War II, invested in social housing. Whitlam invested in social housing. Hawke and Keating invested in social housing. In the global financial crisis, a great stimulus that the Rudd government made under the housing minister, Tanya Plibersek, was in social housing. It is a great Labor legacy that, when we are in government, we invest in providing essential housing for Australians.

We know that housing is a spectrum, that right across the housing industry people who are locked out of one part of the housing spectrum end up in another part. That means that people who can't afford to buy a home end up in the rental market, which drives up prices in the rental market. Less than one per cent of our rental market is available to those who are on benefits or on welfare payments such as the JobSeeker payment. That market is being crunched more and more as higher interest rates drive up the cost of borrowing, and so fewer and fewer people can get into the housing market. We are seeing a slight recalibration of housing prices but, ultimately, we are not seeing on the other end of the spectrum more and more properties being made available to those who are receiving benefits.

The only way we can deal with this is to invest in the supply of housing. That's the only way. In this National Homelessness Week I am really pleased to be part of a government that is going to put $10 billion into a housing future fund that will build 30,000 social and affordable homes. This is one of the largest investments—

The member for Deakin, in a bit, can go through all the things he didn't do in government, but I'm going to keep going. We are putting $10 billion into social and affordable housing, which will build 30,000 social and affordable homes in the first five years. This is the first time that a federal government has put a significant amount of money on the table in over a decade to invest in the construction of social and affordable housing. A portion of it will go towards women fleeing family violence. There will also be $200 million on the repair and maintenance of those currently in remote Indigenous communities, as well as a $30 million fund that will fund specialist services for veterans, which is something all members of the House support.

This does not happen unless the government decides to make it happen. For too long in this country the attitude of the former government was that matters of social housing, especially, were matters for the states. That is no longer the case. The federal government, the Albanese Labor government, is investing proudly in social housing. We are going to help make sure there are homes for Australians in this National Homelessness Week. (Time expired)

Michael Sukkar (Deakin, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Social Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I like the member for Macnamara, but that was five minutes of absolute waffle, five minutes that means nothing. The former government did the most important and significant piece of work for social and affordable housing that any federal government has done by establishing the National Housing Finance and Investment Corporation. I must say, the Labor Party seem to have wholeheartedly adopted it because of the important work it has done in delivering more than 20,000 social and affordable homes since its inception in 2018.

Importantly, when the pandemic hit we put in place a whole suite of measures. One area where the member for Macnamara was not horribly incorrect was that housing is a spectrum. What we did very proudly and unashamedly was support first home buyers. We supported more than 300,000 into their first home, whether it was through the HomeBuilder grants, which those opposite opposed, or through our home guarantee scheme, under which more than 60,000 people have been able to buy a home with a deposit of as little as five per cent or, for single parents, with as little as two per cent to get into their first home. In addition, we put in place the first home super saver scheme, another policy to help first home buyers turbocharge their savings and get into their first home. Yes, the housing market is a spectrum, and if you can assist people to get into their own homes you take pressure off the entire housing spectrum.

In National Homelessness Week, what have we heard from Labor? Labor have spoken a lot about it. It seems to be that the member for Macnamara has said that the Albanese government will assume responsibility for homelessness. He said that the federal government, under the coalition, saw it as the states' responsibility and that the Albanese government does not. So I assume that they now take responsibility for these things.

But let's look at the measures that they took to the election—a very threadbare agenda, I must say. The first is the Housing Future Fund. Unlike the future funds put in place by the coalition under the great Peter Costello, which were established out of government savings, here the Labor Party are going to borrow $10 billion—borrow it—and put it into the fund. Based on assessments that I've seen, in order to deliver on their 30,000 homes over five years, that would require a return on that investment of more than 24 per cent annually, or around the 20 per cent mark annually. I don't know whether members opposite have looked at equities or those sorts of products that the Housing Future Fund would be investing in. Do they seriously believe that that $10 billion is going to generate a 20 per cent return each and every year in order to deliver their 30,000 homes over five years? The member for Macnamara said, 'We're going to build 30,000 homes.' He didn't give the sort of minor detail that that's over five years. That's less per year than we delivered in social and affordable housing when we were in government through the National Finance and Investment Corporation.

So, the Labor Party has gone to the election saying, 'We're going to build fewer homes per year to support social and affordable housing than the coalition government, but we've got this great plan to do it, and we're gonna take responsibility from the states to do it.' What utter tosh from the government! The government is now saying they are taking responsibility, but that means they own every problem, that means they have to work with, in many cases, their state colleagues, who have presided over housing disasters. I mean, the member for Macnamara is a member of the Victorian Labor Party, which has been in office for a very long time, and we see the housing queues in Victoria longer than ever—from this very progressive, bleeding-heart Labor Party in Victoria: the longest queues we've ever seen. What has Labor been doing?

No one believes that this federal Labor government is going to do anything other than spout motherhood statements—the five minutes of guff we got from the member for Macnamara: it was just all motherhood statements, 'We've got a plan and we're going to do this and we're going to do that.' They opposed every single measure we put in place to support people to get into their homes. We are unashamedly a party that supports homeownership but also supports those who, through no fault of their own, need a secure roof over their head. That's what we delivered through the National Housing Finance and Investment Corporation. I'm pleased the Labor Party is adopting that model, but let's not kid ourselves. The Labor Party has nothing other than motherhood statements.

Louise Miller-Frost (Boothby, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This motion asks this House to note that this is National Homelessness Week, and it has a theme: to end homelessness, we need a plan. As the member for Macnamara mentioned, I've spent many years in the homelessness sector, helping people in this situation. In my first speech in this place just last week I spoke at length about the terrifying ease with which people with seemingly stable and comfortable lives can fall into homelessness. It truly can happen to anyone. I've seen it.

According to the 2016 census there were over 116,000 Australians experiencing homelessness that year. Over 19½ thousand of these were children under the age of 14, either unaccompanied or homelessness with their families. Children who experience homelessness are more likely to experience it again as adults. The damaging and unsettling experience of being homeless while your brain is still developing has lifelong consequences. Of those experiencing homelessness, 43 per cent are women, and older women are the fastest-growing demographic experiencing homelessness. Women experiencing homelessness are often less visible, less likely to sleep on the streets and more likely to be couch surfing, staying in dangerous relationships or making dangerous decisions just to be off the streets. And 8,200 of these 116,000 Australians experiencing homelessness were rough-sleeping. Once you're sleeping rough, your physical and mental health declines rapidly. Constant hypervigilance, fear for your safety, lack of sleep and getting inadequate food take their toll very quickly. The average life expectancy of an Australian sleeping rough is 50 years. We don't yet have the stats from the 2021 census, but I can tell you, from the sector, we expect them to have risen significantly.

I was honoured to be the co-chair for the first four years of the Adelaide Zero Project, which, under the guidance of Baroness Louise Casey and Nonie Brennan from the Institute of Global Homelessness, brought together services to work in coordination to address the needs of people experiencing homelessness in the Adelaide CBD, to end their homelessness once and for all. These services included not only the homelessness services but also health, police and local government services, as well as, of course, housing. Coordination of services at the local level is important, but, ultimately, unless there are housing outcomes for people, we just have well-coordinated people on the streets. Nothing changes. And affordable housing is not affordable for these people. It is not affordable for people in homelessness who've lost everything.

This government has inherited a severe shortage of rental properties and an increase in rental prices, and this is only going to exacerbate the number of people experiencing homelessness. Our newspapers are full of people experiencing homelessness for the first time—families separated because they can't all couch-surf at the same house; couples, both working, living in cars because their rent suddenly rose by 50 per cent; and caravan parks reporting that their accommodation is full of people living there long-term. But we shouldn't have to find sympathy via a newspaper in order to get a housing outcome. Doorknocking in Boothby, I came across people living in garages and squatting in derelict houses. People at community meetings told me about families living in cars, on the beachfront and in car parks. They told me about giving blankets and food to the man living behind the shopping centre in a wealthy area of the electorate. A man I met at a charity event pointed to his car and said, 'That's where I live now.'

To end homelessness, we need a plan. Given the theme of this year's National Homelessness Week, I am proud to be a member of the Labor government, which has a plan to address homelessness. Through our $10 billion Housing Australia Future Fund, we will build 30,000 social and affordable houses in the first five years; provide $200 million for the repair, maintenance and improvement of housing in remote Indigenous communities; and provide $100 million for crisis transition housing options for women and children fleeing domestic and family violence and older women on lower incomes who are at risk of homelessness. I look forward to working with my colleague the Minister for Homelessness, the Hon. Julie Collins MP, as this government delivers on that plan to help people experiencing homelessness.

Luke Howarth (Petrie, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Defence Industry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm very pleased to be able to speak at the start of Homelessness Week on this theme, 'To end homelessness we need a plan.' We certainly do need a plan, but the state governments also need a plan. I know, in my own electorate, that homelessness is a real issue throughout Moreton Bay at the moment. People have contacted my office, particularly down at Woody Point, where people are rough-sleeping on the beach in tents and just setting up all over the place. The state government doesn't have the will to police it, because they don't have a plan to solve the problem. That's the reality.

And it's not just through Moreton Bay; it's in parts of Aspley and other areas as well. If you talk to those organisations that support homelessness services, like the Breakfast Club, SANDBAG, the Paddy's Van or Encircle, they'll tell you it's a big issue. But in Queensland alone there are 50,000 people on the public housing waiting list. That's 50,000, and it's getting worse. The state government—the Labor state government; the Palaszczuk government—do not know how to address it at all. There are big issues of them not managing their public housing stock. Their maintenance costs are out of control. The contractors that they put forward to homelessness organisations are charging hundreds and, sometimes, thousands of dollars and above for maintenance. These are state government contractors that are being put forward. The Palaszczuk government are not managing their public housing stock well. They're not recycling their assets. They're not getting rid of some of the old assets and putting in new housing, which is lower-cost. And they certainly are not managing the tenants well, when you've got couples in three-bedroom homes.

Moving back to this motion, the Labor government want to build 30,000 social and affordable houses in their first five years. Well, I commend them for that. They should know, though, that the Morrison government built 20,000 houses through NHFIC, through the community housing sector—which in Queensland, by the way, the Palaszczuk government barely supports; it's all public housing and private sector housing up there. We built 20,000. Even if the government builds those 30,000 houses, they all get handed back to the state governments, and the state governments have maintenance issues. They're not managing the stock and they're not recycling the stock. So I hope that the 30,000 that they do build are very low maintenance and that they think that through, because the states can't manage it.

The member for Macnamara said he wants to make public housing a federal responsibility. If the Albanese government want to be responsible for public housing maintenance, good luck to them. We already spend $1.6 billion a year through the National Housing and Homelessness Agreement, $320 million of which goes to Queensland. In your state, Mr Deputy Speaker Wilkie, we cancelled the debt. We put more money into social housing down there, through the state government, than in any other state. But there are still issues in your state as well.

The other thing is that the government wants to put $200 million into the repair, maintenance and improvement of housing in remote Indigenous communities. Do you know what happened the last time we gave Western Australia money for that? They spent the lot of it on roads. I know that because, when I was assistant minister for homelessness, I spoke to the Labor minister over there. So I'd encourage the new minister and the government to talk to the Hon. John Carey in Western Australia, their new minister, and say, 'When we dish out $200 million, can you make sure that this time it's not spent on roads and it actually gets spent on housing?'

When it comes to homelessness, the biggest group is persons living in severely crowded dwellings: 51,088 in the 2016 census. That's the growing group. The second-biggest group, for the benefit of those opposite, is persons in supported accommodation for the homeless. The crazy thing around this is that, when we spend new money getting women and children out of domestic violence situations and into brand-new homes, every single one of them is counted as homeless in the census, all because the government doesn't give some sort of period like a three-month contract.

I would say that building more houses is important. I would also say that we're currently spending $5.5 billion a year on Commonwealth rent assistance. What are the Albanese government going to do there—put it up or down? What are they going to do with the National Housing and Homelessness Agreement? What are they going to do with NHFIC? Are they going to continue to support it? A lot of the Labor states don't support community housing providers. In New South Wales they do, and we got 20,000 built. There are a whole lot of issues that need answering. We've got 220,000 apprentices in training. We've got the first home deposit scheme. We put forward super for housing, to get more stock. Those opposite opposed.

Peta Murphy (Dunkley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Young Frankston man Jack Knight was 18 when a family breakdown left him homeless. As he told ABC News during the election campaign, he spent a couple of nights on a friend's couch before he ended up sleeping in a garage. It was very cold, he said, and he was wandering around Frankston because he didn't know what to do next. He came across a youth hangout, and someone offered him a sausage in bread. He said to them, 'I just have nowhere to go.' A support worker helped him into transitional housing and then into a share house. Jack is now a terrific social worker in Frankston. He started studying youth work and, as a case manager, helps other young people facing homelessness. He's a story of success. But, unfortunately, that success is unattainable for too many young people in my area.

According to Youth2 Alliance, which is a group of local organisations that help young people in trouble, over the last two years 390 people aged between 15 and 25 in the Frankston-Mornington Peninsula region needed emergency housing. But there was nowhere to send them. We know that, in addition to a lack of emergency and transitional housing in my area, particularly for young people, the increase in rents has become a significant crisis. Frankston house rents rose 12.5 per cent, to a median $450 per week, over the past year, and in Frankston North, one of the most disadvantaged areas in my community, rents rose 10.1 per cent. Young people like Jack when he was in that situation can't get into those private rentals.

During the election campaign, the Youth2 Alliance asked all of the candidates for Dunkley to sign a pledge—and I did so—because in the Frankston and Mornington Peninsula regions there was an increase of 50 percent in the rate of young people aged 15 to 25 requesting assistance with securing crisis housing over the COVID time. Frankston and Mornington Peninsula are two of the six worst local government areas in Victoria, with homeless residents sleeping rough every night. There are no local crisis accommodation options for young people, so they're forced to travel up to 2½ hours on a one-way journey on public transport to somewhere like Highett or Dandenong, or sometimes even further, to find somewhere to sleep.

During the election campaign, Andrew Bruun, YSAS CEO and Chair of the Youth2 Alliance, asked us to pledge to play a role in addressing the social parity issue faced by young people and families living in my community without secure housing. We were asked to commit to advocating for youth-specific crisis accommodation in Frankston and the Mornington Peninsula region and to commit to working actively with local community service organisations, lived-experience advocates like Jack and local and state governments to end youth homelessness in Frankston and the Mornington Peninsula. In this, National Homelessness Week, it seems an appropriate time for me to repeat that pledge in Australia's Parliament. It is something that I am committed to and, with this Albanese Labor government, I am confident that we will make great strides to solving. I don't know how many speeches I gave in this parliament over the last term calling on the previous government to support these calls for youth crisis accommodation in my area. They weren't answered, but I will not give up.

I can't be there on Wednesday, but the Salvation Army is holding an 'end youth homelessness' rally, asking people to come and make a plan—that's the theme of homelessness week: make a plan—share ideas and grab a sausage at the White Street Mall on Wednesday. I wish them all the best of luck and hope that people in my community go, because this is something that we need everyone to buy into and work together on. Council, state government, federal government, services and our local community need to work together to solve this issue.

I'm really pleased that housing and homelessness has been elevated to cabinet in the government that I'm now a part of. We have a plan through the Housing Australia Future Fund. Importantly, we have a plan to work with state and local councils for all levels of government to come together to do what we can to pull all the levers to end homelessness. It's the least our constituents deserve.

Aaron Violi (Casey, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Homelessness is a complex social and economic problem. It can be the result of relationship breakdown, family violence, unemployment and mental health issues, and, in most cases, a combination of these. Everyone deserves a home, a place to feel safe, welcome and accepted. National Homelessness Week is being launched today with the theme 'to end homelessness we need a plan'. I'm proud to participate this afternoon in the launch of the Yarra Ranges Homelessness Week 2022 broadcast, where we will engage in a conversation with local charities and the council about the progress and strategies around this issue.

In my electorate of Casey, unfortunately homelessness is a major local issue. In the 2016 census there were 360 people in Casey experiencing homelessness. However, I know through conversations with local organisations that this number is under-reported. In Casey we have some wonderful services and organisations, supported by governments, providing practical and sustainable assistance to local people in their time of need. Most people need temporary assistance and, once given a helping hand, will be able to go on to support themselves and their family. In 2021, almost 278,000 people around Australia were provided with assistance, equating to 1.1 percent of the Australian population.

In Casey we have many great organisations that support this, like Anchor, which is located in Lilydale, which provides outreach to Healesville, Yarra Junction and Warburton for those who cannot come into the office. It provides information and referrals for those in need, with the goal to transition people into long-term, sustainable housing. They're helping rough sleepers and people needing food assistance or emergency accommodation. We're also lucky to have the Philanthropic Collective, run by Andrew, which provides food relief for those in the Dandenong's. I was fortunate, earlier this year, to help Andrew and his team pack hampers and support those in need when they need that temporary support. I'm looking forward to continuing to support Andrew and his team this year.

The Redwood Community Centre in Warburton provides food relief and phone support for those in need in the Upper Yarra, in Casey, while the Yarra Ranges Housing Action Group coordinates all the areas of Casey to make sure we can support those who need it. I'm very fortunate that my good friend Neal Taylor runs Holy Fools, which is a for-impact charity designed to support those in need in Lilydale and the surrounding urban areas. I've known Neal for about five years, and his organisation has run for 12 years. He's organising today's event, and I want to pay tribute to Neal for the work that he does for the homeless people in Casey and for the support he provides to them.

While we're doing a lot locally and we have a lot of great organisations supporting homelessness, we need to understand that we're facing significant economic challenges, which put further pressure on our local organisations and those across the country with regard to homelessness. We're facing high inflation and we've got rising interest rates, and that's going to put even more pressure on our most vulnerable.

The ultimate solution here is for the government to have a plan to address these rising cost-of-living pressures. Unfortunately, last week, when we heard from the Treasurer, he was looking in the rear-vision mirror, back at the last government, and criticising, not looking forward to provide a solution for those most vulnerable in the country. We're going to see an interest rate rise tomorrow, which is going to put more pressure on people's budgets. We need a plan from this government to address solutions now, not in September or in October.

Unemployment is currently at 3.5 per cent, and we know that the greatest solution to reduce homelessness and pressure on our most vulnerable is a job. So, as we face these challenges of high inflation and rising interest rates, the government need to ensure that they keep unemployment as low as possible, because it's not about a number. It's not about 3.5 per cent. It's about the people that are behind this number. This is the challenge that this government faces. We need our Treasurer to stop looking backwards in the rear-view mirror and to look forward, because a rising tide lifts all boats.

So, while I welcome the government's commitment to develop a new national housing and homelessness plan, with the support and assistance of key stakeholders, I hope they can include some of my local organisations, like Holy Fools and Anchor, so they can contribute to this plan.

Luke Gosling (Solomon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Albanese Labor government recognise the deep and systemic challenges around homelessness throughout our nation, and we are serious about our plan to deal with homelessness and housing insecurity, which is a growing crisis in this nation. Few things can be as daunting as a lack of certainty around where you'll sleep at night. We all know that homelessness takes many different forms. It can be sleeping rough, couch surfing, living in your car or bouncing between temporary accommodation and mates' places. We also know that there are many other challenges around housing, including affordability, quality and overcrowding, which is a particular problem in the Northern Territory. Our federal government is committed to engaging across the sector, and that's why we've elevated the Housing and Homelessness portfolios back into cabinet.

I know how serious a problem homelessness is from my time as the NT CEO of St Vincent de Paul Society. I'm still a volunteer with Vinnies and recently look part in the CEO sleepout. The profoundly negative impacts of homelessness are obvious. It robs far too many people in our communities of the stability and security needed to flourish and to thrive, and we can't let these issues fester unaddressed. We can't allow more vulnerable people in our community to fall through the cracks. We see certain groups overrepresented far too often, whether it's people fleeing domestic violence, young people, people with disabilities or mental health issues, veterans, the elderly or people who straddle several of these cohorts.

As a Territorian I also welcome the $200 million committed to housing works in remote Aboriginal communities. Knowing the serious issues in these communities, I know this will make a real difference. The problems around quality of housing in remote communities mean that First Nations people are often living in very overcrowded conditions, with up to 20 people living in a three-bedroom house. There are then the knock-on problems with health and sanitation and disruption to kids' sleep and schooling—those social determinants of health. It also creates a bigger reliance on the public housing in Darwin, which is already strained.

In the NT we have wonderful organisations working in this space, such as Yilli Rreung Housing, and I want to acknowledge the board of Yilli and in particular the CEO, Leeanne Caton. Yilli manage 246 properties and have 40 staff, helping to provide housing, which means that more families can have certainty around where they live and sleep. That includes temporary accommodation for those visiting from the communities, so they can be safe when they visit town for various reasons.

I'm also very committed to veterans and our first responders who face housing insecurity from time to time. More than housing insecurity, they can experience homelessness. I think some of the evidence given so far to the royal commission into veteran suicides has shown that. On separation from the ADF—and I've been there, as you have, Mr Deputy Speaker Wilkie—you can be a bit lost sometimes. I understand that. So I was very proud to secure $3 million for a veterans and first responders supported housing hub in my electorate of Darwin. The Scott Palmer service centre, named for Commando Scott Palmer—the only Territorian killed in Afghanistan—will be focused on providing services, accommodation, family support and recreation facilities for those who are homeless or at risk of becoming homeless. The primary goal is to assist our veterans and our first responders to secure permanent accommodation in social housing or in the private rental market.

As I said, I pushed very hard for the royal commission, because I knew that there were systemic problems in the way we supported our men and women in uniform. The same goes for first responders. I think the evidence has pointed to a need for this supported accommodation, with case management and referrals to DVA and organisations such as Open Arms, health professionals and employment services. A supported accommodation facility will save lives. I commend the member for Macnamara for bringing forward this motion, and I know that this government is going to get on with helping our homelessness situation.

Angie Bell (Moncrieff, Liberal National Party, Shadow Minister for Early Childhood Education) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Macnamara for giving me another opportunity to speak on this topic that I'm so passionate about—homelessness—which absolutely affects my Gold Coast community. In fact, I just came back from returning to the Gold Coast on the weekend for a homelessness fundraiser for the St Johns Crisis Centre based in Surfers Paradise. They look after those in our city who are in crisis—those single mums and children who are living in cars in my community. In Homelessness Week, my thoughts go out to those who are living in that crisis situation. I thank St Johns Crisis Centre for the $200,000-odd that we raised on Saturday at the Gold Coast Turf Club. Also, a couple of months ago my community came together in the Gold Coast CEO sleepout, and we raised $630,000 for our local community on the Gold Coast for those living in the crisis conditions of homelessness.

What members haven't done in this debate today is ask: why? Why does the Gold Coast community have to come together to raise funds for homelessness in Queensland? I'll tell you why. It's because the Labor Palaszczuk government haven't delivered what they should be delivering for homelessness in Queensland. There are 50,000 people on the homelessness register in Queensland, and it is a disgrace. I'm on record asking the Auditor-General what Queensland have done with the $335-odd million that our federal government, under Scott Morrison, delivered to Queensland last year for social housing. Palaszczuk herself has actually been in the paper admitting that the Queensland government have spent only $200 million out of the $2 billion worth of funding that they have in their budget for social housing. Yet the member for Surfers Paradise, my state member, tells me that there is only one room in Surfers Paradise for those people needing social housing. So we have a situation on the Gold Coast where St John's Crisis Centre in Surfer's Paradise, St Vincent de Paul—known as Vinnies—and Rotary International clubs, including my local Rotary club, are raising funds to help the homeless in our city because the state government, the Labor Palaszczuk government, are not doing what they need to be doing to deliver social and affordable housing to the good people of the Gold Coast. It is simply not good enough.

We need to do more about homelessness, and I'm hoping—actually, it is a bit of an ironic situation when we've got interest rates skyrocketing and inflation out of control—that we might actually see Gold Coasters start to open some of the second or third rooms in their homes to those people who can't afford to live in our city anymore because of this situation of unaffordable housing. I'm hoping that in the short term this will be the solution. It's certainly not the Albanese government that is racing to the aid of those who find themselves in this position of homelessness. As to what the state Labor governments are doing, we've heard from Queensland federal members talking about what's happening in Queensland, but we've also heard from Victorian members. Notably, both states are under Labor governments that haven't done their job when it comes to delivering for homelessness and delivering affordable social housing for those members of our community who need extra help. It's not good enough, and the state governments absolutely need to lift their game to help those in our community, especially on the Gold Coast, who find themselves living in their cars or who find themselves living on the streets in Southport.

Further to that, I will add that my local council, to their credit—including Councillor Brooke Patterson, to her credit—have actually established two local council officers to go around and help the homeless people living to our city in Southport and also in Surfers Paradise, where Councillor Darren Taylor is also doing a great job in trying to help individuals who find themselves in that position—one by one helping them out with wraparound services like St John's Crisis Centre, the Gold Coast Project for Homeless Youth and Vinnies, who are assisting in this space. I thank, lastly, members of my community who put the money on the table to help the most vulnerable living on the Gold Coast, who need a hand up.

Andrew Wilkie (Clark, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The time allotted for this debate has expired. The debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting.