Homelessness Week
Will FOWLES (Ringwood) (09:58): I rise today to speak about national Homelessness Week, which begins next week. It is a time to reflect on the urgent and growing need for real action to end homelessness in Australia. The theme for 2025 is ‘Homelessness action now’. It is a clear and direct call to governments at all levels to stop delaying and start delivering. At the last census, 30,660 Victorians were without a home, almost a third of the national total. This includes children, young people, families and older women, people sleeping in their cars, on friends’ couches or in unsafe, overcrowded or temporary accommodation. In a city and a state and a country as wealthy as ours, this should never be accepted as normal. Homelessness is not inevitable. It does not just happen. It is the direct result of political inaction and decades of policy failure, and the solution is no mystery: homelessness is fixed with homes. We need more social and affordable housing, and we need it now, not years down the track.
At 10 am this coming Tuesday I will be joining the Homeward Bound Walk at Ringwood Lake, hosted by Eastern Homelessness Network. It is an opportunity for the local community to come together, raise awareness and demand urgent action to end homelessness. I look forward to walking alongside many familiar faces in a powerful show of solidarity with those experiencing housing insecurity. To my colleagues in this place, housing ends homelessness. Stop the delay, stop the spin and start building.