Tuesday, 14 May 2024

 Harriet SHING (Eastern Victoria – Minister for Housing, Minister for Water, Minister for Equality) (12:56): It seems to be a bit of a theme today, but I do want to talk as Minister for Housing around the work that we have done in light of last week’s budget and the allocations that we are making. Across all levels of government, and in partnership with industry, we know that there is no one single answer to the challenges of affordability and availability. As Melbourne grows to be the size of London by 2050, we know that fixing the housing supply shortage across the state, as it takes place here and indeed interstate, requires a range of different engagements and processes, including through the affordability partnership and the work we are doing with industry, with the community housing providers and indeed with communities and local councils, where they are coming on board. We are pulling every possible lever that we have available to us to build more homes for more Victorians and providing the care and the services required to keep people safely in their homes.

In the portfolio of housing we have invested $217 million extra in this budget in social housing and homelessness. This includes $197 million to fund the state’s most crucial homelessness frontline services: Launch Housing, the Salvos, Kids Under Cover, Sacred Heart Mission, Anglicare, MacKillop Family Services, Queerspace – and the list goes on. Thank you so much to everybody across the sector who is doing such profoundly important work to support people in their time of greatest need. There is $19 million for additional improvements to the maintenance systems and processes across public housing rentals. We know we need to respond faster, and that is what we are doing. We want to make sure that people can live safely and comfortably, including by way of renewal in this housing stock. There is more than $1 million for food relief to support tenants in social housing. This investment is on top of our government’s $9.8 billion record-setting investment in housing and homelessness since 2014. Nearly $2 billion was added in just the last 12 months.

We are making sure that we are pulling every lever available to us. These are the levers that we are pulling. This is what we are building. It is difficult work, it is long-term work and it is work that involves engaging carefully with families, with households and with communities about what it is that they want as we meet the challenges and the opportunities of population growth and the ever-important need for people to have connectivity, pride of place and community, which are all so important in making sure that everybody has rights and opportunities. I am looking forward to seeing the federal budget handed down tonight so that we can build on that $451 million under the new agreement over the five-year term of its duration. (Time expired)