Disability advocates are urging the Palaszczuk government to hold its nerve amid a campaign from the building sector to delay changes to make Queensland homes more accessible.
In August 2022 all states except New South Wales agreed to implement changes to the National Construction Code to require new homes to meet minimum mandatory standards providing step-free access and corridors wide enough to fit a wheelchair, as well as a range of energy efficiency reforms.
The changes were to take effect from October in most states, but as it stands, only Queensland, the Northern Territory and ACT will meet that deadline, with Victoria, South Australia and Tasmania now opting for 2024 and Western Australia yet to commit.
A recent Queensland building industry campaign to delay the changes has already caused the government to push back implementation by 18 months for small lots of 12.5-metre frontage or less.
The chief executive of Spinal Life Australia, Mark Townend, said Queenslanders “shouldn’t have to wait any longer” for equitable housing.
Townend said while builders were claiming “the sky’s going to fall in” and they’ll go “broke”, taxpayers were paying exorbitant costs to retrofit homes that were not accessible through the NDIS.
“Taxpayers are funding $34bn within the NDIS and a lot of it’s going towards home improvements,” he said.
“I’m supporting the [public works] minister and the government to hold its nerve … It’s a lot cheaper for taxpayers doing it now than in the future.”
The chief executive of Master Builders Queensland, Paul Bidwell, said their “conservative estimates” showed costs to implement both the livable housing and energy efficiency provisions of the code would increase the cost of new Queensland homes by about $20,000-$30,000.
“We stand by our view that now is not the right time to increase the cost of new housing. We are in the middle of a housing crisis and costs have already risen by 42% over the past three years,” he said.
The changes have been discussed for many years, with the group previously campaigning against them, but Bidwell said builders were still getting across the precise requirements for implementation.
“Every other state in Australia has acknowledged the challenge in adopting these new requirements … the Queensland Government has not,” he said.
Jackson Hills, the policy and strategic engagement manager at housing peak body Q Shelter, said he appreciated the concerns about cost but delaying these important new standards was “just kicking the problem further down the road”.
“The changes will positively impact people in our community who are elderly, vulnerable, or perhaps in a wheelchair,” he said. “They will also save individuals and families money in the long run, and likely defer costs from the health and residential care system.”
He said he understands building industry bodies are making their case to the government and “to their credit they have a put range of ideas on the table about possible concessions and assistance to help make the transition more orderly”.
Dianne, who requested not to provide her surname, is one of the elderly Australians who would benefit from the changes. Living with spinal issues in a small public housing unit in Brisbane’s southern suburbs, she is surrounded by “tripping hazards”, and knows she is likely to need a wheelchair sometime in the future.
“So far I haven’t done myself any damage but … some of my neighbours have had terrible falls … How can we be the lucky country?”
El Gibbs, the director of policy and advocacy at the Disability Advocacy Network Australia (DANA), who also lives with a disability herself, said it was “disappointing” the measures had been delayed by the majority of states.
Further delays, she said, would mean “more inaccessible houses will get built and more people with disability and older people will be shut out of having a home”.
The state’s public works minister, Mick de Brenni, said almost one in five Queenslanders is living with a disability and the cost of retrofitting a home to make it accessible is about 20 times building an accessible home to begin with.
He said the reforms would ensure “quality of life and comfortable living for the almost one in five Queenslanders that are currently living with a disability”.
“These reforms will take pressure off hospitals and free up bed capacity in both the health and aged care sectors,” he said.
