Growing Demand for Social Housing - Report
29 May 2015 at 12:29 pm
A new report by Australia’s national agency for health and welfare information has revealed a growing demand for housing assistance and long waiting lists for social housing.
The Housing Assistance Australia 2015 report by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) found the number of households in social housing – which covers public, community and Indigenous housing – was up 4 per cent from 2007-08.
It also found that waiting lists remain long, as do waiting times for allocation with some 46 per cent of public rental housing allocations that were classified as in greatest need spent more than two years on a waiting list.
There were 394,000 households in government-funded social housing in Australia in 2013-14, while nearly 206,000 applicants were on waiting lists.
AIHW said around three-quarters (74 per cent) of the newly-allocated social housing in 2013-14 went to households in greatest need.
“Households in greatest need are highly vulnerable groups such as people experiencing or at imminent risk of homelessness, households where there is a member with a disability, or the main tenant is aged either under 25, or is 75 or older, or where the household has one or more Indigenous members,” AIHW spokesperson Geoff Neideck said.
The report found that between 2007-08 and 2013-14, the number of public housing households fell from 331,000 to 317,000, while mainstream community housing households rose from 36,000 to 67,000.
“The rising cost of public housing managed and run by state and territory housing authorities has seen a transfer of ownership or management to the community housing sector run by non-government and Not for Profit organisations,” Neideck said.
