The fiasco of public housing evictions

The fightback against the demolition and eviction of public housing tenants continues in Melbourne with a new film that chronicles the eviction of public tenants from Barak Beacon, a development with “sweeping bay views” just three kilometres from the CBD.

The removal of tenants for new housing echoes a bitter fight to protect tenants at Sydney’s Millers Point nearly a decade ago, where homes were privatised. And it is now being replayed in Marrickville in Sydney’s inner west.

In Melbourne, the homes will be redeveloped as part of the Victorian government’s $5.4 billion Big Build program for new housing, which is clearly welcomed.

However, observers are not happy with the methodology. This involves the government program using a new ground lease model, in which the land remains publicly owned but is leased to a consortium of developers and community housing providers for 40 years.

Professor Libby Porter, director of the Centre for Urban Research at RMIT University, says the model is deeply flawed and will cause greater inequality.

“Our housing system inevitably produces injustice and vulnerability because it is oriented toward extracting wealth rather than supporting basic human needs of shelter, belonging and community,” Porter said.

“Public housing is a vital part of building a more just and equitable housing system. Tearing public housing down and privatising it has lasting and devastating impacts on people and will bake inequality into inequality into our society for years to come”

In Sydney, protests against the Fairer Futures plan in inner city Marrickville continue

Almost 300 people had marched from Marrickville Town Hall to an apartment building on Warren Road, where 20 residents were notified by QR code of their pending eviction.

This comes after nurses withdrew their support of the council’s plan last month, citing concerns that the council’s plans to build 44,000 new homes for 90,000 new residents would replace low-income, affordable and social housing with expensive homes. 

Better Future Coalition, the group representing residents, said 17 out of 20 residents being evicted were from an affordable rental art deco building to pave the way for 43 new apartments, which will have nine fewer affordable units.

The group said the community was “outraged” by the council’s plans, which rezones “huge swathes” of the local government area, with developers targeting older affordable buildings first as “the low-hanging fruit.” 

Resident Erina Delinicolas urged the Prime Minister, who grew up in social housing in the area, not to “pull up the ladder behind him.”