‘Shame job’: Clifton Hill housing estate awash with raw sewage

Residents of an inner-Melbourne public housing estate say raw sewage flowing under the building and into a shared courtyard has been making people sick.

The Clifton Hill estate, on the corner of Rutland and Noone streets, is home to dozens of people. When The Age visited on Thursday, wads of sodden toilet paper and a flood of sewage were visible beneath a flat, partially hidden by a loose board at ground level. A children’s playground is metres away.

Clifton Hill residents Luke De Nittis and Aunty Tracey Briggs.Credit: Wayne Taylor

“It’s been years like that,” said Aunty Tracey Briggs, who has lived in the estate for 15 years.

“It’s a shame job. It makes you feel like nobody, and we’re all somebody. People have been getting sick here.”

The courtyard was awash with sewage for weeks before The Age sent queries to Housing Minister Danny Pearson’s office on Wednesday.

Black mould covers the ceiling of one of the flats in the Clifton Hill estate.

Late that night, workers arrived at the estate to clean up the sewage. Workers were also onsite on Thursday, using pressure hoses to remove the worst of the sewage from the courtyard, which leads to the playground, and departmental officers arrived to speak to residents.

Three residents said they had complained for years about maintenance problems at the estate, including water leaks, cracked ceilings and broken sewerage pipes.

Black mould covers the bathroom ceiling in Briggs’ apartment. Resident Luke De Nittis, who has lived in the flat above for five years, said he could only shower for a few seconds at a time because water leaked from his bathroom into her flat below.

“I wonder what the kids growing up here think – is that what the government thinks of us?” he said.

De Nittis said that in all the years he had lived in the estate, there had never been an inspection of his apartment.

“One phone call to Pearson and there’s five plumbers here,” he said. “And if that didn’t happen, we’d still be breathing in shit every morning.”

The issue was highlighted in a social media post by Greens candidate Gabrielle de Vietri, who first visited the estate on Monday.

De Vietri said she had been shocked at what she found there.

“You literally have to step over shit to get to the playground,” she said.

“It’s just deliberate neglect. How can you expect people to get a job, get an education or have a sense of self-worth when their basic needs aren’t being met? And you can imagine what impact it’s had on people’s mental health.”

Greens candidate Gabrielle de Vietri at the estate. To one side is the playground, and to the other is the area beneath the building that filled with raw sewage.Credit: Wayne Taylor

De Vietri is running for the state seat of Richmond, which covers Clifton Hill and has been held by Labor’s Richard Wynne for 23 years. Wynne is retiring at this election, and Labor has preselected Lauren O’Dwyer, a Fitzroy resident and associate director of First Nations programs at the Arts Centre.

Housing security is a major election issue in the electorate, where more than 53 per cent of residents rent their homes.

The dilapidated Rutland Street estate is nestled in one of the wealthiest suburbs in Victoria. Clifton Hill’s median weekly income of $2755 in 2021 was almost one-third higher than the median weekly income of $1759 across Victoria.

The seat of Richmond, which takes in the suburbs of Fitzroy, Collingwood, Clifton Hill, Richmond, Burnley and Cremorne, has one of the largest proportions of renters in the state, and both Labor and the Greens are actively targeting the tenant vote ahead of the November 26 state election.

Pearson, through his office, declined to respond to questions including whether he believed it was acceptable for public housing residents to be living with raw sewage pooling beneath a building and in open spaces.

A Department of Families, Fairness and Housing spokesman said contractors were engaged on Wednesday to fix the sewer blockage and “it was urgently cleared that day”.

“The department is working with the water authority to resolve any issues that may be causing blockages at the site,” the spokesman said.

He said the issue appeared to have been rectified, but further investigation and works would be done as required.

Despite this, sewage continued to pool beneath an apartment on Thursday.

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