By David Deex, Anti-Poverty Network SA member, and public housing activist
The State Government recently released a ‘Housing Roadmap’ of which the biggest things were more money to support infrastructure for private development in land releases. This is effectively ‘crown land’ released by the government. In addition, proceeding their housing roadmap, the government announced the removal of stamp duty for first home buyers on all new homes, the Seaton housing renewal project, and the trading name of the SA Housing Trust ‘SA Housing Authority’, scrapped, meaning the SA Housing Trust name is near fully reinstated.
In this article, I’ll go over a few of the things in this housing roadmap and provide some of my thoughts. I’ll also cover a few other things, too.
Land Releases:
Land Releases have been a huge part of the Government’s housing agenda. They want to increase supply by over 25,000 homes. While more supply is welcome, there are concerns sound the timeframe, because it could take over 20 years for all homes to be built, when we need supply now. Additionally, there are two other core issues, one being urban sprawl. Has the government considered the need for much more walking, cycling and public transport? What about choice in the kind of housing? Townhouse? Apartment? Single family detached home? Semi-detached?
And then there is the issue of there being no plans for public housing in these areas where land is being released. Let’s take Concordia, which is slated for around 10,000 homes over 25 years. At the moment, none of those houses will be public homes, meaning we will see more of the same issues with a primarily privatised housing model. If just 25% of homes were public, we’d have an additional 2,500 public homes. The math is easy to do on higher levels of public housing.
All these issues are not to mention that SA Water customers are shouldering an increase in water bills to pay for new infrastructure to private developments.
More supply is great, but more urban sprawl is not. We need to be focusing on building communities with great public spaces, filled with high quality homes and housing choice, not just private single family homes.
Stamp Duty:
Stamp Duty being removed from all new builds for first home buyers sounds nice at first, however, it is not likely to take the heat out of the housing market, nor guarantee homes become more affordable for first home buyers, because prices can just be raised on homes being sold. Stamp Duty is also not replaced with anything, meaning the government takes in less money, and it continues to encourage home ownership as the goal, and does not stop anyone from using this to start becoming a landlord.
Seaton Housing Redevelopment:
Seaton public housing needs to be renewed. This I will not disagree with. However, it is proposed that over a 10 year period, 419 public homes is replaced with 1450 homes, of which 419 will be public and of which some more will be social and affordable. While replacing public homes on a 1:1 basis is better than in many other urban renewals, this is public land. If the government had chosen to deliver 50% public housing on site, South Australia could have an extra 306 public houses.
If they had chosen to deliver 75% public housing on site, South Australia could have had 668 extra public houses. These are just some examples, but we should think about the prospects of a good renewal project, because renewal cannot be avoided, but how we go about renewal can be changed to suit the interests of communities.
“Bringing back the Housing Trust”:
The Government’s welcome announcement that they are “bringing back the Housing Trust name” makes you think “So surely this will mean a proper return to hiring tradies to build thousands or tens of thousands of new public homes and maintain houses too? Awesome!” And “Wow, this must mean we’re going to be getting lots and lots of new public homes!”
Except no. That’s not what it means. Instead it was unfortunately an in name only move that at best is designed to show their commitment to continuing with ever so slightly reversing the decline of public housing in South Australia. There is a maintenance review, but I expect this to be more of the same at this stage.
What should be done?
Firstly, here’s a message for everyone who wants a fairer housing system and stranger, safer communities: We must embrace high quality medium density development. Medium density development done well around neighbourhood centres can encourage community connection and provide more options for people to use public and active transport, as well as ensure the essentials of life are closer, bringing down the cost of living. It’s critical that this isn’t just for people on higher incomes, but for everyone.
Secondly, the State Government needs to act fast on public housing. The head contract for maintenance needs to be ripped up following the upcoming maintenance review and brought back in house. Tradies aren’t being paid properly, then there’s the issue of call centres being in house within the Housing Trust, the head maintenance contract being with Spotless, and then Spotless sub-contracting.
This leads to miscommunication around maintenance jobs. Once the head contract is back in house, we could start to once again hire trades people directly for many jobs. We also can and should make the South Australian Housing Trust a public builder and developer. Public Housing should be built to at least an 8 star energy efficiency rating, and be truly disability accessible. Public Housing should be universal, with little to no means and income tests.
Thirdly, we need rent freezes and caps. The length of time for a rent freeze can be debated, the figure of a rent cap can also be debated, but renters need some breathing room now and into the future. We need to make renting a more reasonable option for people from all walks of life.
Together, we can create better communities, but this housing roadmap falls very short of doing what’s required, and feels more like a give away to business in the industry rather than doing what’s right for the development of our whole state. It’s crucial that this moment be used for something different, looking backwards in honour of South Australia’s public housing history, and adapting it for the future. It’s well past time to address the housing crisis.
Anti-Poverty Network SA 