As someone who’s had the privilege of speaking to hundreds of people around my electorate doorknocking for Max at election time, I can say that my biggest takeaway is just how disconnected politics is from the lives of everyday people. 

Organising some of our housing doorknocks across Queensland over the last few months has only reinforced just how little hope people have in our political system to provide the bare necessities. 

Modern politics is known for the major disconnect between politics and civil society, in particular the Labor and Liberal Party. Building a capacity to reach people directly, and bridge that disconnect, gives us a major advantage over the major parties, giving us the ability to genuinely speak on behalf of people and adopt political positions that reflect what people actually think on the ground.

As a party, we are most powerful when we’re acting and communicating in a way that takes us outside of the Canberra bubble. Ordinary people are experts in their own lives, and we have so much to learn when we get organised and have this opportunity to test our messages, and genuinely consult the public. It’s also a method of reaching voters which the major parties haven’t mastered yet. 

Back in June we had the first sign that Labor wasn’t just taking notice of our doorknocking efforts as part of our housing campaign, they were scared. In early June we had a doorknock organised in Annika Well’s electorate of Lilley in Brisbane. Labor organised a counter-doorknock, meeting in the same park, half an hour before we were scheduled to, to try and get the jump on us and reach the doors before we had the chance.

They may have outnumbered us on this particular occasion but we were able to meet voters where they were, talk to them and not at them, and exhibit how politics can be done differently. We’ve even had self-identifying “rusted-on” Labor voters at the door sign our petition as they can clearly agree that Labor's housing bill is nowhere near ambitious enough to tackle the housing crisis.

Over the last few months we've knocked on over 10,000 doors across the nation and had 2605 meaningful conversations with people who overwhelmingly support us. We've had 83% of respondents agree that the Government’s housing bill needs to be more ambitious and 75% agree that we should block the bill until Labor agrees to negotiate. 

From doorknocks to market stalls, we’ve had hundreds of Greens volunteers come together across the country to fight for renters and direct investment in public housing.

And just like that, we've seen Labor backflip and offer $2B in direct investment for social housing. They had told us that it wasn't possible, that there had been no more funding in the budget and the Future Fund was the only way. Well, everything is impossible until it's not. This is what happens when the Greens stand up to Labor & demand real action on the housing crisis.

I’ll leave you with one recent conversation which reminds me of who we’re fighting for. A few weekends ago in Woodridge, I spoke with two sisters in their mid 70s, Shirley and Rosalind, who were living together in a one bedroom flat. Rosalind’s rent had recently been put up from $240 a week to $360, an increase of 50% which she couldn’t afford on her pension, so the only option left was to move in with her sister. I walked away from that conversation a bit teary. It’s pretty clear just how broken our housing system is when people well into retirement can’t rely on having a secure roof over their head. 

The fact is, Labor doesn't have the numbers to pass their Housing Bill in the Senate, and as much as they’d like us to give up, we won’t stop fighting for the millions of people this plan leaves behind. Labor has admitted they can spend $2 billion directly on housing, now they need to commit to investing this every year and finally take action to coordinate a freeze and caps on rent increases.

The fight isn’t over. Our housing campaign needs to continue ramping up pressure to win real outcomes for renters. The Greens will never stop fighting for the people the government is leaving behind. To all of the volunteers who have contributed so far and to the countless others who support us, thank you. 

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