Labor will formally move for an urgent Parliamentary Inquiry into Tasmania's housing crisis when State Parliament resumes this week.
Shadow Housing Minister Alison Standen said after five years of inaction by the Hodgman Government on housing affordability, the availability of public housing and growing homelessness, it was proposed the inquiry focus on the key issues that have led to an unprecedented point of crisis.
Ms Standen today released the Terms of Reference for the proposed inquiry which would focus on several areas including:
- Experiences of Tasmanians in housing stress or homelessness
- Management of social housing and delivery of new stock by Housing Tasmania and community housing providers
- Impact of a lack of affordable housing on the broader economic and social wellbeing of the Tasmanian community
- Impact of a lack of affordable housing on the implementation and outcomes of other State Government programs
- Effectiveness and limitations of current State and Federal Government strategies and services to alleviate the impact of poor housing affordability in the Tasmanian community
- Impact of historic housing debt on the management and delivery of social housing
- Strategies to address the $73 million maintenance liability of Housing Tasmania and community housing providers
- Impact of population growth on housing supply
- Relationship between housing, health and education and
- Successful strategies in other Australian States that could be effective in improving affordability in Tasmania
"Premier Hodgman and two successive Housing Ministers - Jacquie Petrusma and Roger Jaensch - have now had a combined five years to provide shelter for Tasmanians and have failed," Ms Standen said.
"Tasmanians have a right to understand how that failure has occurred and - now that failure has resulted in an unprecedented housing crisis - how we can provide shelter for the thousands of Tasmanians who are struggling to pay the rent, who cannot access public housing and who are either facing or in the midst of homelessness.
"It's not good enough that on any given night 1,600 Tasmanians are homeless. It's not good enough that many, many other families are couch surfing, relying on their friends and families or living in sheds or cars.
"We've heard enough of the unfulfilled promises, we have heard enough of the spin which has produced minimal results and we don't need any more hastily pulled together talkfests which do not result in roofs over heads.
"There has been a primary failure of the Hodgman Government to adequately plan, accurately forecast, resource or urgently act upon the range of issues impacting on housing supply.
"We need to formally examine what has gone so terribly wrong so that we can find solutions and ensure that into the immediate future, no Tasmanian family is left out in the cold because of a fundamental failure of government to provide a basic but essential human right."
Alison Standen MP
Shadow Housing Minister
