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Legislative Council - Fifty-Second Parliament, First Session (52-1)
2011-09-28 Daily Xml
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SOUTH AUSTRALIAN HOUSING TRUST (MISCELLANEOUS) AMENDMENT BILL

Introduction and First Reading

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE (17:45): Obtained leave and introduced a bill for an act to amend the South Australian Housing Trust Act 1995. Read a first time.

Second Reading

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE (17:46): I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

This Housing Trust reform amendment bill is a multifaceted bill giving effect to promises that Family First has made to reform public housing, given the way the state government, in my opinion, is failing to administer the housing trust in a responsible way. A great majority of law-abiding Housing Trust tenants in South Australia are suffering at the hands of an irresponsible few, but there is also a very mean-spirited approach to pensioners in public housing when it comes to their pensions.

In addition, community housing tenants are being treated even more harshly by the targeting of their commonwealth rent assistance. This bill seeks, so far as it can, to rectify those issues, though on the pension and rent assistance side it is for future matters and not, sadly, to resolve grief about the Rann government taking hard-fought pension increases from 2009 through public housing and community housing rents. Family First is always reticent about retrospective legislation and in this instance we are asking the government to pass this bill and be open and transparent about future rent increases and, most importantly, be fair to pensioners, given the cost of living pressures they are under.

Turning first to situations that will give rise to ending your tenancy, the provisions in this bill give effect to the expectation of tenants and the community at large that people who commit serious criminal offences whilst they are tenants must lose their tenancy. Public housing tenancy is a privilege, not a right. The United Kingdom housing minister has taken that stance, saying he will back the local councils (which administer public housing in England) in evicting people who got involved in the July rioting.

Family First acknowledges that sometimes children and partners are innocent victims of an adult's offending; his or her offending should not see them kicked out of public housing if they can meet the thresholds to remain there. The bill also empowers Housing SA to obtain criminal histories so that we do not have silly privacy protection for tenants who refuse to disclose their convictions for serious criminal offending. We have been careful to state that the offending must occur during a tenancy. A person who once offended but who is on rehabilitation in the community is, in our opinion, entitled to tenancy. Once they have served their time they are entitled to try to get on their feet but, of course, if they offend again these provisions come into play.

The provisions of this bill also tackle illicit drug production in public housing. Quite simply, it must stop. If the tenant is growing cannabis or cooking amphetamines in their tenancy, they are out under this bill. I cannot see how you can justify someone keeping their tenancy if they are a drug cook or a dope grower; there is no justification whatsoever. Lastly, the three strikes policy on disruptive tenants that Labor has trumpeted since coming into office is codified under this bill. The government has acknowledged in the past its policy of three strikes, but unfortunately, depending on the minister, we have not seen it happen in practice; this bill codifies that policy.

Secondly, the elements relating to rents: clause 4 requires rents to be declared and varied by regulation. This makes those rent increases disallowable by this parliament. Furthermore, clause 1 of the schedule bans the South Australian Housing Trust from requiring community housing to impose rent in such a way as the SAHT wants. It gives autonomy to community housing, which I understood was one of the intents of the basic principles of community housing in South Australia.

The reason for this structure is that it is the legislatively effective way to tackle the behaviour of this government in seizing pension increases it said it would not seize. It also stops the government from forcing community housing organisations to seize commonwealth rent assistance by way of rent increases. I have had much written communication with the Hon. Jenny Macklin. She, as the commonwealth minister, is scathing of the Rann government for taking that money that was put aside to help those on low incomes and pensions to afford utility costs, only to end up seeing 25 per cent of it ripped off them and going into additional rent with Housing SA.

The community housing organisations are over a barrel on their funding and the government can force them to recover rent assistance from pensioners through threats to cut funding if they do not. This is what has happened, and it is not acceptable. If community housing organisations want to recover full rent assistance, so be it—they are accountable and answerable to their tenants. For the government to force them to take tenants' rent assistance is unconscionable. We have had a very large number of community housing tenants contact us about this matter.

Of broader application and therefore even more unconscionable is the backflip on quarantining pensions. Premier Rann said he would not do it; former prime minister Rudd said he had told premiers not to do it—then Premier Rann did it anyway. As I said, minister Macklin has given minister Rankine what I would describe, at the least, as a good telling-off about it—but not one stroke of discipline or recourse back to the state government. I have the correspondence and documents to back that up.

It is a shambles and demonstrates the way this state Labor government has totally lost its moral compass, just as it has with requiring the vulnerable—in some cases the very same tenants—to pay for public hospital car parking. We have tried and tried to get the state and federal governments to listen but they are doing nothing. Sadly, what is done is done and all we can do is move these amendments.

I will be up-front: if passed, we will use these powers. I am sure colleagues in this house would, because we would have a tool that we need in a democratic society—particularly in the people's house, the Legislative Council—to move disallowance on government if the government is so ruthless in the way it is ripping off pensioners and low-income earners.

If the council supports us in this bill we are telling the government that it will be on thin ice if it jacks rents up again any time soon, running the risk of having them disallowed in this house. The government got more than its fair share when taking that pension increase. I mention thin ice deliberately because I think there is a case for the freezing of rents for a year given what has happened to these people over the last several years.

The third measure is a provision that seeks to reform water metering of Housing SA homes. Housing SA will be required to put individual meters on each and every home and to report regular progress on that in its annual reports.

I want to point out that the parts of this bill are severable. I do not want honourable members to feel that they cannot support the bill because they like one part but not the other. If, through debate, it seems apparent that part of the bill has support but not others, we could consider changes or look at amendments during the debate. This bill is, of course, also open to amendments. We need to have this debate and I look forward to honourable members' contributions.

The Hon. Dennis Hood, other colleagues and I have already made many comments in the media on public housing. Here is the opportunity to put those comments into action to reform an area of public administration in South Australia that should not be toxic, but has become so, due to dreadful mismanagement by the government.

They have talked tough on antisocial behaviour in public housing, but done nothing. Now they have to act or justify to this house why they will not act. In conclusion, this week is the celebration of the 75th year of what we know—and what I prefer to call it—as the Housing Trust. It was set up by the Hon. Sir Thomas Playford and set up to ensure that low income earners and people on pensions had an opportunity for affordable housing. What we see now is 20,000 people waiting—

The Hon. A. Bressington: On welfare housing—

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE: —legitimate people who should be getting housing. As my colleague Ann Bressington rightly interjected, we are seeing welfare housing. We are seeing people who should be in supported accommodation become—unfortunately for themselves and for good salt-of-the earth tenants—totally disruptive tenants. It is time, with respect to mental health and illicit drug rehabilitation, etc., that we have the right accommodation for them and we go back to the basic, original, proven and intended 75-year-old charter, which was housing trust for people on low incomes and pensions. I commend the bill to the house.

Debate adjourned on motion of Hon. I.K. Hunter.

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