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Minister Rose Jackson (on Federal Housing Policy): (16.13 on audio)
The New South Wales Government is incredibly excited about
the engagement with the Federal Government and local government partners about
the prospect to do more on social and affordable housing.
I think, the interest that the Labor Government
has shown in delivering social and affordable housing is an incredibly
refreshing change from the approach of the previous government, which didn’t
even have a housing minister in the Cabinet and showed no interest.
So obviously we’re enthusiastic about the Housing Australia
Future Fund passing. We have got our team ready to go as soon as it does
passes, assuming it does to put in submissions on behalf of our
state, which we are thinking will secure somewhere around 16,000 new dwellings,
new affordable housing dwellings for our state over five years.
That’s not enough. It’s not nearly enough to solve the
housing crisis, but it’s a good contribution. So that’s a fantastic opportunity
for us to build on that. We’re really hopeful that it does pass, so all power
to you, Tanya. We’re also just enthusiastic about the delivery of the
housing and homelessness plan from the federal government, an actual strategic
approach to how we are going to resolve housing and homelessness.
We’re very engaged in that. So, I think we’ve
always said we’re not interested in blame shifting. We’re interested in working
together. The federal government has shown that seriousness. We’re trying to
show that seriousness, too. But it’s a big opportunity for us in New South
Wales. I don’t want to oversell it. I’ve never been interested in
saying, the Federal Government’s contribution alone is going to be
enough to resolve the challenges we face.
There’s no point when you get enough activity from
politicians at one point pretending that that contribution alone is going to be
enough. The state government is going to have to step up and do a lot more and
we’re interested in doing that. But having said that, we would not be able to
resolve this challenge on our own without a federal partner who was going to
put finance on the table, land on the table, options on the table. And so I
think we have that.
Minister Rose Jackson (on Waterloo South): (26.30 on audio)
So in relation to Waterloo South, specifically, the position
that the new government has adopted is not different to the position that we
had before the election, which is that the previous government’s proposition in
relation to that redevelopment was a bad plan and we didn’t support it.
Our capacity to rework that plan is limited at the moment
because procurement is underway. That was a process that was commenced by the
previous government and we aren’t able to stop that without massive
compensation to the participants in that process. And potentially we want to
see what comes out of it. We don’t know what’s going to come out of that
process.
I would say I’m advised it’s probably about a month away
from producing an outcome based primarily on the specifications that the
previous government gave to that process. That would then be our opportunity to
come in and say, okay, well, we didn’t support that plan. How can we turn what
that has produced into something that we do support?
So I completely understand people’s frustration about
wanting quick decisions. I want that too. But similarly we can’t
rush things when there are processes that were initiated.
It’s going to produce a result. That’s our opportunity to
make a good decision. And there are a couple of principles that will underline
that decision. And in fact, all about the state redevelopment decisions, which
is our interest is more social and affordable housing.
So we will not be supporting any process going forward that
does not deliver a substantial uplift in the number of social and affordable
housing. Every day I ask the Department of Communities and Justice what is
happening with the waiting list. There are 100,000 people waiting for social
and affordable housing. Thousands and thousands of those people are children.
We know that those people are sleeping in cars, in tents, in caravans. We need
more social housing. We have to deliver projects that deliver more dwellings.
And the voice of people on the waiting list is a really important voice not to
forget. So that is a core principle. We want more. Excellent.
Another principle is
we want modern homes, homes and modern amenity, not shit boxes. That are too
cold or mouldy or don’t have disability access. So we want modern homes for
people to live in, homes that deliver dignity to people.
We don’t want to sell government land and we won’t sell
government land as part of these projects. That is not what any of these
renewal projects will result in.
Any tenant who is relocated as part of any redevelopment
will have a right to return to the development to the new site. So there will
be an automatic guaranteed right of return to anyone who is temporarily moved
as a result of redevelopment and any relocations.
Temporary relocations will occur in the local area.
And we reactivating the Charter on estate renewal that was
developed in 2016 by the Tenants Union and Shelter and city futures at UNSW,
which is a really good document that talks about delivering control and
autonomy and agency and voice.
So those are principles that apply to all potential state
redevelopments that the State Government will undertake. Exactly how that plays
out site by site, as I said, take a long time to go through all of that.
And specifically on Waterloo South, those principles will
underpin the decision that we’re keen to make as soon as we can in about a
month we will have the opportunity to look at where the proposals are up to and
then make some decisions about how to apply those principles to that project.
Question: (41.21)
So it’s been reported that last year the New South Wales
Labor conference unanimously passed a resolution
committing the incoming State Government to, amongst other things, introducing
legislation that prohibits the privatization of any and all public housing in
New South Wales, including the outsourcing of public housing to third party
providers, legislated and enforceable communities sorry commitments to
expanding the amount of public housing in the inner city as a proportion of
total housing stock.
So my simple yes or no question to the Housing Minister is
do you consider the 2022 public housing conference motion to be the policy of
the New South Wales Labor Government?
Minister Rose Jackson: (42:19)
Yes, I do. And we’re working on the legislative process. I
mean, as I always said, I’m actually just keen to get started. And so that’s
kind of what we’re doing. The legislative process, particularly in a minority
parliament, is unfortunately slow.
There’s a lot of bills lining up that we’re working through,
including a range of rental reform that is a top priority for the government.
So ending no grounds evictions, allowing pets in rentals, establishing an
affordable rental bond scheme, all of that work is winding up on the
legislative agenda. I’ve always said my priorities just to get started on
housing, and there’s a lot that we can do without legislation and to me that’s
a key priority.
Hopefully we’ll have the HAFF coming online in July. Fingers
crossed. We need to be ready to get our 16,000 homes into the HAFF process.
That’s a huge piece of work that we’re massively prioritising. We don’t need
legislation to need to do that. We need action from government. Top priority of
mine, a lot of the work that we can do just building more social housing stock,
getting the maintenance contracts redone in public housing, all of that can be
done without legislation.
And we’re doing that and we’re getting that done right now.
The stuff that needs legislation, rental reform, that’s top of the legislative
priority list. A lot of the good stuff we can do in public housing, we’re just
getting on with doing it and we’re going to focus on that because that’s the
urgency. But we will get to legislative reform when the legislative timetable
allows for that.
[The above is based on
a meeting transcript of comments made at the REDWatch meeting of 5 June 2023. It
should be checked against the audio
prior to wider use. REDWatch acknowledges the City of Sydney Council for its
assistance with a transcript of the meeting.]