Futile Hunt Haunts Families
The Age
Tuesday June 3, 1997
The urban search for shelter bordered on the impossible, welfare workers said yesterday.
An outreach worker with Merri Housing, Ms Janet Walker, said in eight months of working with families in Collingwood, Fitzroy and Richmond she had not succeeded in placing anyone in private rental accommodation.
"The agents often tell me it is not unusual to have 50 or 60 people applying for one property," she said. This demand pushed rents up and allowed agents to be choosy.
Would-be tenants were expected to provide rental references, proof of income and evidence of a stable employment history. Ms Walker said it was difficult for a single mother with children to get a look in the door.
When private rentals and public housing were unavailable the only options were caravan parks, rooming houses or private hotels. These were unacceptable for adults, and manifestly unsuitable for children, Ms Walker said.
Many children were functionally illiterate and innumerate due to a nomadic lifestyle, moving from temporary dwelling to dwelling.
A Wheelers Hill Family Service housing worker, Ms Anne Bamblett, said the lack of accommodation for those on low incomes would see the next generation of politicians being asked to apologise to the children of homeless people.
Ms Bamblett said her agency found itself dealing with the "new homeless", low-income and middle-income earners who were recently left unemployed by streamlining and the reduction in the size of workforces.
Speaking at a Council to Homeless Persons forum, she said the dearth of available rental housing meant that government rental subsidies were meaningless.
And the pathway to eligibility for priority government housing forced families to go through the "humiliating process" of getting up to seven knockbacks from estate agents before they could join public waiting lists.
The manager of the Salvation Army's St Kilda Crisis Centre, Ms Jenny Plant, said emergency accommodation facilities were crammed, and the only options available were private hotels and caravan parks.
© 1997 The Age