Polwarth electorate public housing
Richard RIORDAN (Polwarth) (10:55): I rise again in the house this morning to raise the parlous state of public housing, the management of public housing and the way that we treat some of the most vulnerable families and people in the state of Victoria. I refer specifically to my own electorate of Polwarth, where I received distressed phone calls yesterday from community housing workers at the local neighbourhood house and other places, reporting to me that the housing services in my community of Colac Otway are now by phone – they are only available for people if they book online and if they are prepared to wait 2 or more hours on a phone. This means that for the 356 government housing properties in the Colac region, the most vulnerable people, who often do not have access to the internet or a mobile phone, are left having to go and seek support from the local library, the local community house, the Salvos and others in order to book an appointment just so that they can raise issues, such as safety issues in their own home, the availability of hot water and heating and other basic essential services. There is almost zero coverage now in my electorate to look after people who are in the most vulnerable state. This is a terrible situation. It comes on top of the fact that this is a government that claims to have an ambition of 12,000 new public housing houses, but after three years it has only delivered 74 homes to the people of Victoria.