Labor may be on the nose in inner Melbourne over public housing – but it’s taking the fight to the Greens

Richmond public housing resident Pauline was relocated from her home of more than 30 years after the block was scheduled to be demolished by the state government. Photograph: Christopher Hopkins/The Guardian

Pauline’s journey to Australia was long. Part of the Chinese Hakka minority targeted during Indonesia’s invasion of Timor-Leste, she went first to Jakarta, then Portugal, before finally making her way to Melbourne in 1984.

Since then, the 76-year-old has lived in one of North Richmond’s high-rise public housing towers, living what she describes as a “quiet, peaceful life”.