Housing News Digest
Housing News Digest
The Tenants' Union Housing News Digest compiles our pick of items from all the latest tenancy and housing media, sent once per week, on Thursdays.
Below is the Digest archive from November 2020 onwards. From time to time you will find additional items in the archive that did not make it into the weekly Digest email. Earlier archives are here, where you can also find additional digests by other organisations.
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Archive
Shelter NSW priorities for the NSW Budget 2022-2023
(No paywall)The NSW Treasury is currently preparing for the next state budget (2022-2023). No doubt there will be a great many difficult choices and trade-offs made. Our submission does recognise the NSW Government’s early action in the pandemic to support particularly vulnerable groups however, our overriding observation as we enter 2022 is one of concern. In 2022-23, NSW faces an interrupted and uncertain economic recovery with rising housing costs contributing to cost-of-living concerns for many, but especially for lower income households. Our view is that NSW is not well-placed to respond to the precarious economic conditions of the mid-term, let alone the longer-term trends of an aging population and income/wealth inequity. Responses by Government and a strained community and social sector are failing to keep up with current demand. NSW requires the following measures ... [to] prevent homelessness and support economic development and employment across the state, including in regional towns and cities. [Read on]
https://mailchi.mp/shelternsw/shelter-nsw-priorities-for-the-nsw…
# NSW, Public and community housing, Rent, Utilities electricity water gas, Affordable housing, Campaigns and law reform, Homelessness, State Government.‘No-fault’ evictions set to be abolished under Levelling Up White Paper plans
Grainne Cuffe Inside Housing (Paywall)From the United Kingdom ... Section 21 ‘no-fault’ evictions are set to be banned in the private rented sector (PRS) as part of the government’s long-awaited plans to ‘level up’ the country. The move was officially revealed ahead of the full release of the Levelling Up White Paper today, which aims to balance prosperity across the country by investing in poorer areas, and means private landlords will no longer be able to evict tenants for no reason. There are also plans for a number of other changes for private renters, including a requirement that all homes in the PRS meet the Decent Homes Standard; potentially introducing a landlords register; and cracking down on rogue landlords, “making sure fines and bans stop repeat offenders leaving renters in terrible conditions”.
https://www.insidehousing.co.uk/news/no-fault-evictions-set-to-b…
# New policy announcement International, Rent, Landlords and agents, Minimum habitability standards, No-grounds evictions.Scott Morrison's awkward Grace Tame photo opportunity brings a string of other unfortunate images back to haunt him
Laura Tingle ABC (Paywall)[Anthony Albanese] found himself being asked by the ABC's Andrew Probyn at the National Press Club this week to explain who he was. ... He told the story of his first campaign, driven by a threat to the security of the public housing where he lived from a change of local government: "My first campaign, I was 12 years old. We organised a rent strike. We took petitions around to everyone. That was my experience of that. That drove me. That was my first political campaign. And by the way, we won."
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-01-29/scott-morrison-grace-tame…
# Australia, Rent, Campaigns and law reform, Federal Government, History, Local Government.Alleged assault the ‘last straw’ in street parking dispute
Amelia McGuire The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)Residents of an eastern suburbs street say the serious injury of a man in an altercation over parking is the final straw in a long-running series of hostilities in the area. For the past 20 years, Sydneysiders have used Bundock Street in Randwick to park their caravans, trailers and boats for extended periods. There are no time limits on the street, which runs beside Defence land on one side.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/alleged-king-hit-on-resident…
# NSW, Local Government, Planning and development.Queensland government reviews social housing above new Gabba station
Tony Moore The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)The Queensland government will spend 10 months determining how much “affordable” housing will be included on the state government-owned land above the new Woolloongabba train station. However, 50 per cent of the site – stretching from the Brisbane Cricket Ground across the Go Print site where the underground train station is being built – to the Morrison Hotel, will now be green space. Read Tony Moore's earlier article entitled: 'Lord mayor wants 600 affordable units above new Gabba rail hub' at: [https://www.smh.com.au/politics/queensland/lord-mayor-wants-600-affordable-units-above-new-gabba-rail-hub-20220131-p59sjy.html] You can read Antonia O'Flaherty's story on the same issue entitled 'Calls for Woolloongabba Cross River Rail precinct to include more affordable housing' at: [https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-01-31/calls-for-affordable-housing-at-woolloongabba-cross-river-rail/100792324]
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/queensland/queensland-government…
# Australia, Public and community housing, Affordable housing, Local Government, State Government.Why more housing supply won’t solve unaffordability
Douglas Dodd (No paywall)Things are so out of control in Canada’s overpriced housing market that some politicians and pundits are pleading for the country to mimic a novel New Zealand policy, with many acting as if it’s The Answer to affordability. They’re saying Canada should rapidly join New Zealand in banning single-family zoning and allowing residents, for instance, to build up to three storeys without requiring consent. Real-estate developers claim getting rid of pesky city approvals will allow them to build more housing faster. Their argument, admittedly, can seem logical: Construct more housing and prices will go down. But there are at least five reasons this superficial solution to combating price escalation doesn’t often work ...
https://vancouversun.com/opinion/columnists/douglas-todd-why-mor…
# International, Housing market, Planning and development.Tenant ‘stoked’ with $220pw sleep-out after 55 applications
(No paywall)From New Zealand ... A Wellington tenant is “stoked” to be living in a sleep-out which is considered the fifth bedroom of a house. Breakfast revealed the tenant is paying $220 per week excluding expenses for the sleep-out. They have access to the main house where the kitchen, bathroom, toilet and remaining bedrooms are. Breakfast's Abbey Wakefield said the tenant had applied for 55 other flats before netting the sleep-out, which she described as a "shed". (1 News)
https://www.1news.co.nz/2022/01/30/tenant-stoked-with-220pw-slee…
# International, Rent, Share houses, Housing market.How Brad Pitt’s green housing dream for Hurricane Katrina survivors turned into a nightmare
Judith Keller The Conversation (No paywall)From the United States ... Brad Pitt’s Make It Right Foundation built 109 eye-catching and affordable homes in New Orleans for a community where many people were displaced by damage wrought by Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Now this housing development is in disarray. The vast majority of the recently constructed homes are riddled with construction-related problems that have led to mold, termites, rotting wood, flooding and other woes.
https://theconversation.com/how-brad-pitts-green-housing-dream-f…
# International, Affordable housing, Mould.