Victoria’s pool of social housing has grown by just 74 units in four years despite the government embarking on a multibillion-dollar “Big Housing Build” and a growing waitlist for homes.
Data from the latest Department of Families, Fairness and Housing (DFFH) annual report shows there were 86,887 social housing dwellings across Victoria as of 30 June 2022 – a net increase of 74 since 30 June 2018, when there were 86,813.
At the same time the social housing waitlist has grown by about 45% – from about 44,000 applications in June 2018 to 64,168 in June 2022. More than 40% of applicants were on the priority waitlist last June.
The government is meant to report social housing data quarterly, but is yet to publish figures for September or December 2022.
“I would hazard a guess the data isn’t available because it isn’t good,” the opposition’s spokesperson for housing, Richard Riordan, told Guardian Australia.
“The reality is, we have a crisis on our hands. In the last year alone, the number people on the priority waitlist grew by more than 3,000 families.
“There are thousands of families without a roof over their heads in Victoria right now and the government is sitting there, patting itself on the back about the ‘biggest build ever’. It’s shameless.”
In November 2020, Daniel Andrews and the then-housing minister, Richard Wynne, announced the $5.3bn “big housing build” to rectify decades of under-investment in social housing.
At the time, Wynne said 12,000 homes would be constructed by 2024 as part of the “biggest commitment by any state government ever”. This included 9,300 new social housing units and 2,900 affordable homes, as well as the replacement of 1,100 old public housing units.
In July 2022 his successor, Danny Pearson, held a press conference to mark the halfway point of the big housing build. He said the government had invested $2.8bn so far and was “on track” to deliver at least 16,000 social and affordable homes by 2026.
Libby Porter, a professor at the centre for urban research at RMIT University, said she was not surprised the investment had barely made a dent on supply.
“We are demolishing many [dwellings] at the same time we are building,” she said.
Porter describes the big build as a continuation of other projects, including the public housing renewal program, which involved the government engaging private developers to replace old public housing with new social housing.
For developers, profits came from a new private housing component on the same block. Private non-for-profits then manage the social housing.
Porter points to six sites at Ascot Vale, Flemington, Hawthorn and Heidelberg, five of which were public housing estates. Combined, they made up 446 public housing units before they were demolished. They were replaced with a mix of 540 private and 500 social housing units as part of the Big Build.
“It’s total net gain of 54 social housing dwellings across six sites, at the cost to the public of $532m, which is $9.85m per dwelling,” she said.
Kerrie Byrne, a long‐time public housing tenant and a former community sector worker who is part of the Save Public Housing Collective, was more blunt.
“The winners out of these projects are property developers. Meanwhile, public housing is being left in a shambles. All over the state, public housing tenants are living in unsafe, unhealthy conditions, with mould and leaky buildings a frequent problem,” she said.
Byrne cited Port Melbourne’s Barak Beacon estate, which is set to be demolished and replaced by a new development. Some 89 dwellings will be replaced with a mix of social, affordable and private homes.
“A 10% increase in social housing is only nine properties. For nine properties they are displacing 200 tenants, including elderly people who are seriously traumatised by what’s happening,” Byrne said.
Guardian Australia has previously reported a staged renovation of the Barak Beacon estate could increase stock by 200.
Porter said the government would be better off maintaining and refurbish public housing properties via significant recurrent funding in the budget.
She said modelling conducted by RMIT would see a $5.3bn spend just on public housing would deliver about 20,000 new dwellings, more if they were constructed on public land, and keep the assets in public hands.
A Homes Victoria spokesperson said that at the end of January, more than 7,600 homes had been completed or were under way, and more than 1,700 households had either moved or were getting ready to move into brand new homes.
“The data in the 2021/22 annual report represents the first year of the Big Housing Build, with the majority of new homes to be delivered over the next three years, including larger multi-dwelling developments,” they said.
“The Big Housing Build will increase the supply of available social housing by more than 10% over the life of the program.”
The spokesperson said total social housing stock numbers were affected at different times by a number of factors, including renewal projects and tenant relocations.
This article was amended on 17 March 2023 to correct a reference to the waiting list having nearly doubled in the standfirst. The social housing waitlist has actually increased by nearly half.
