Page 4372 - Week 10 - Thursday, 22 September 2011
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parliamentary agreement. Under appendix 2, item 6.3, the Greens requested that the ACT government adopt a goal of 10 per cent public housing stock and in the short term fund an additional $10 million in additional public housing stock.
Public housing is recognised as being the most secure form of affordable housing that the government can invest in. The government has responded with help from the commonwealth stimulus package by increasing the number of public housing properties in the ACT from around 11,500 to 12,000. The Greens do recognise that very significant figure.
In the last budget the Greens made a budget bid for the $10 million. The government provided $9.4 million in order to provide around 32 dwellings. The development will be in the form of an intentional community which will include three young men with disabilities, an extremely worthy project, and something that the mothers of those young men have worked to achieve. I do congratulate the government on recognising that project.
Keeping the public housing stock up at around 12,000 will require the investment of $5 million a year, which the government has stated is already built into Housing ACT budgets. Data from the Australian Institute for Health and Welfare has shown that demand for public housing is going to grow by 30 per cent by 2021.
The Greens want to see the overdue public housing asset management strategy. The government has promised that the strategy will be made public by the end of the year. We need a clear strategy on how the ACT is going to meet demand into the future, particularly when the federal stimulus funding ends.
With regard to the redevelopment of the Bega, Allawah and Currong flats, the government has said it will be decreasing the number of public housing units at that site and moving some tenants to the outer suburbs, but of course only those who want to move. The Greens are concerned by the cut in public housing unit numbers on that site. We appreciate that some current tenants will want to move, but we do need to consider future tenants and what their needs will be. The Greens believe future public housing tenants should have just as much chance as previous ones to live close to Civic, with its services and amenities.
I appreciate the concerns the government has raised about what public housing blocks can turn into if there are a number of vulnerable tenants located on the one site. There are, however, many developments, particularly in some parts of the UK and also in Melbourne, which have been highly successful as they have provided tenants with energy-efficient multi-unit sites that tenants are proud to live in. There is also a mix of tenants in these blocks and they have been successful in terms of what they have achieved, so we should not be disregarding those sorts of developments. And if social development and improved on-site management are added, there is a greater chance that the community will be successful. K2 in Melbourne is an example of a successful project.
The government has also recently announced that it will redevelop the Northbourne flats site, and it is fair to say that the Greens do hold some concerns about this. It
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