Housing
Katherine COPSEY (Southern Metropolitan) (12:29): (883) My question today is for the minister for housing. Minister, in a ministers statements last sitting week it was pleasing to hear you assure us about the redevelopment of the North Melbourne and Flemington public housing estates and that every eligible resident will have a right of return. That right-to-return messaging echoes the public messaging from Homes Victoria, but it seems in contrast to the Homes Victoria relocation manual, which under the heading ‘Insufficient redeveloped housing’ says not only that the right to return will be subject to availability but also that residents who had been at the original site longer will be given priority over people who had been at that site for less time, including people who might have, for example, been relocated from another site slated for demolition. Minister, are there other caveats on the right to return?
Harriet SHING (Eastern Victoria – Minister for the Suburban Rail Loop, Minister for Housing and Building, Minister for Development Victoria and Precincts) (12:30): Thank you very much for your question and thank you for the opportunity to be able to continue to discuss the right of return as we develop and build new social housing to meet that demand. As I indicated in previous answers to the chamber, and as I have talked about at length in the community, the right of return is a really important step in providing residents with certainty around what a relocation process will look like, not only from an original place of dwelling to a new location for the duration of a redevelopment but also what happens at the end of that redevelopment.
We know that many people in the course of discussions about what they want to do make different decisions to the decisions that they had indicated a preference for at the time of relocation. They may, for example, have chosen to move from an inner-urban environment and from an apartment into a suburban block with a backyard and a balcony, space for a dog and for the kids to spend time outside, and that that may be their preference to remain in that sort of configuration at the end of a relocation. We of course work with people who have been at a specific location for longer in making sure that when a relocation opportunity is provided to people to return to the same location or to the neighbourhood, that their connections to the area are respected and recognised in the longevity of their original residency and tenure. We also, though, do want to make sure that when we do have relocations in place we are working with people around what their eligibility looks like. Again, as I have said here in this place before, people may well be eligible for a different type of housing, a different type of configuration. If, for example, you do not have the same number of dependants and therefore you do not require the same number of bedrooms, then the eligibility will change for the sort of configuration that you have asked for and that may then shape the sort of housing that is made available to you as part of relocations.
We also, though, want to make sure that in the course of a relocations discussion we are providing people with as much information as they need. Circumstances around relocation will therefore be informed by what it is that residents want, whether it is a return to the site itself or a return to the neighbourhood, a return to one type of housing or a return to another. But what we do work really, really closely with communities on is making sure that there is the best possible measure of autonomy in the decisions that residents take and also making sure that we respect the importance of certainty in those processes. So the manual is there to assist housing officers and residents with the breakdown of processes around relocation and the assistance that Homes Victoria provides as well as the processes whereby residents and their families can express views and preferences and have them taken into consideration, again with respect for longevity of tenure.
Katherine COPSEY (Southern Metropolitan) (12:33): Thank you, Minister, for that answer. Minister, 33 Alfred Street, North Melbourne, is a community where many larger families live, as there are 152 homes, all of which are two- or three-bedroom. Will there be enough larger dwellings on this site so that all these families will be able to exercise their right to return to this site if they choose?
Harriet SHING (Eastern Victoria – Minister for the Suburban Rail Loop, Minister for Housing and Building, Minister for Development Victoria and Precincts) (12:33): Thank you for that supplementary question and for the specific example that you have raised around North Melbourne. The families who have a need for additional bedrooms beyond, say, a studio or a one- or two-bedroom home are not configurations unique to this particular development. One of the things that we did do with the design of the new homes at the Carlton red-brick towers was to consult with communities around what those larger homes looked like, so four- and five-bedroom homes. This is where, again, it will come down to eligibility. So when people are being relocated, the return may not necessarily be for a dwelling configuration that is the same as the configuration that they originally had, due to changed circumstances. We will continue to work with communities around the sort of demographic and the sort of need that applies there, but as I said, the right of return is a really important part of providing residents with certainty. Again, we will work closely with communities around understanding what individual families’ needs are and whether they want to return to the same site or to the broader neighbourhood, for example, where housing configurations may be able to better meet their needs.