A Lismore disability pensioner who relies on a wheelchair remains homeless months after the devastating floods, the disability royal commission has been told.
The royal commission on Monday commenced a five-day hearing examining the experiences of people with disability who are homeless or at risk at homelessness, including those sleeping rough, couch surfing or living in marginal accommodation.
Flood victim Colin*, 58, told the inquiry he was currently in “limbo” as he was being bounced around different short-stay hotels.
The disability support pensioner was staying at his sister’s home when the floods hit in February this year and he described the dramatic moment when he was rescued by two locals in a “tinnie”.
He said the weeks after the flood had been a “blur” and he’d finally been provided emergency accommodation after exchanging a few choice words with the New South Wales premier, Dominic Perrottet, when he had been visiting the area.
Since then he has stayed in motels and caravan parks in Tweed Heads and Ballina, among other places, usually for a few weeks at most. He is currently in temporary accommodation at Lennox Head.
Colin, who has lived in Lismore his entire life, said being housed in other towns meant he was isolated from family support.
And he said the motels offered by the NSW state government lacked cooking facilities and were not accessible for him.
Sometimes it meant “14 days without a shower”, Colin said.
“I‘ve got no support, I’ve got nothing. I’ve got no way of cooking food, there is no fridge … [The] bathroom I can’t use,” he said.
In her opening remarks, senior counsel assisting, Kate Eastman, said the evidence was likely to identify a number of systemic issues including “a lack of affordable, suitable and accessible housing for people with disability and an over-reliance on crisis and temporary accommodation”.
New figures presented on Monday showed that in 2021-22 there were 6,306 NDIS participants were either homeless or at risk of homelessness.
That included 1,594 who were confirmed as homeless, the data showed. There are about 500,000 NDIS participants in Australia.
Separately, an estimate from the Australian Bureau of Statistics suggested about 10,200 people with severe or profound disability had experienced some form of homelessness in 2016.
The royal commission chair, Ronald Sackville, said the figures revealed “a significant social problem that demands attention”.
“Of course, NDIS participants are not the only people with disability who
experience homelessness or are at risk of homelessness,” he said. “Additional data
will be presented during this hearing to provide a more complete picture
of people with disability who are homeless or at risk of homelessness.”
Eastman said the people with severe or profound disability were also over-represented among certain forms of marginal housing.
These included boarding houses, which were a focus of the evidence of another witness, Charlotte*, who told how she had stayed in boarding houses in the 1980s and 90s.
Charlotte, who lives with a number of disabilities including schizophrenia, said she had experienced violence and abuse from the owner and other residents at the boarding houses.
In a statement to the royal commission, Charlotte detailed shocking abuse in the facilities, which are regularly criticised by advocates as unsafe and exploitative.
“I was hit and raped while I was living there,” she said. “One time I got hit so hard on the back of the head that it bled. I still get scared sometimes if people touch my head or brush my hair because it reminds me of being assaulted there.”
Dawn*, 78, told the inquiry she lives in a Marrickville boarding house. She said she had previously slept rough, including when residents in past boarding houses had made her feel unsafe.
“You learn to be quiet so they can’t hear you,” she said.
*Names are pseudonyms given by the royal commission.
