2019-01-06
By the Green Issue Editors
In the months leading to the expected May 2019 federal election, the Editors want each edition of Green Issue to focus on one of the policy priorities that The Greens will be presenting to voters. For this December edition we have chosen the policy priority of Housing for All.
The four people who have written on this topic take very different approaches. However, they all agree that the importance of having an affordable, decent, secure home cannot be over-estimated. Moreover, they are united in their understanding that the policies supported for at least the last 30 years by successive Labor and Coalition Governments have spectacularly failed to achieve Housing for All – haven’t even got close, in fact have relentlessly widened the gap between the housing haves and have-nots.
The struggle to obtain an affordable, decent, secure home is experienced most acutely by young people. Max Larkin and Jesse Hutchinson are both in their twenties. They explain how the widening gap between the typical incomes of young people and the cost of housing has impacted on them and other young people they know. Australia has a major crisis of unaffordable housing, compounded for the many who are priced out of home ownership by a market skewed heavily in favour of owners/landlords.
In Jesse’s words: “Unaffordable rents, short leases and strict rental conditions lead to a lack of stability for renters and this has a particularly negative effect on children and young people.” He argues that we need to rewrite the rules to make sure that people who rent are granted stability in their leases and conditions and that rental prices are reasonable and attainable for working people and those doing it tough.
Max Larkin shares similar experiences and takes aim at the policies of recent Coalition Governments for deliberately creating this grossly unfair housing obstacle course that young people must navigate. Jaiden Coonan is another twenty-something Green who has a strong interest in creating A Fair Go for All in housing. His article focuses particularly on the problem of Homelessness and is based on research he conducted during an internship with Tim Clifford.
Rob Delves outlines the many reasons he is proud to advocate for The Greens policies on Housing, particularly the proposed solution for the state to step in and oversee the construction of 500,000 good quality, affordable homes. He notes that The Greens don’t have any revenue raising proposals that are directly linked to paying for this essential home building program. In fact, in Australia, it is rare for any revenue source to be directly linked to specific public spending. However, he believes that this building program should be funded by a broad-based progressive tax on property owners. Why?
It is a matter of basic fairness that the people who’ve benefited from these massive windfall gains in property wealth should be taxed to pay for the unmet housing need that is partly caused by their gains.
In this issue we also have an end-of-year update on the good, the bad and the ugly of climate change action, in Australia and globally. The world is dragging its feet for sure, but Australia is at best standing still but probably by now walking backwards into a furnace. But, some hope for climate, and general environmental, action in the knowledge that ‘Greens’ is a global movement. We report on a recent activities of the Global Issues Working Group (GIG) featuring a visit by Greens from Nepal.
In the Victorian State Election held at the end of November Labor well and truly trounced the Coalition, but The Greens did not show up so well. We take a look at the results to see what lessons the WA Greens can learn for their upcoming campaigns.
We include updates from our Greens (WA) MPs, for the November-December period. There are reports from Senators Rachel Siewert and Jordon Steele-John and our Members of the WA Legislative Council Robin Chapple (Mining and Pastoral), Alison Xamon (North Metropolitan), Diane Evers (South West) and Tim Clifford (East Metropolitan).
Header photo: Suburban Perth. C. Johansen