NT government-owned public houses in Alice Springs, Darwin to hit the market, Treasurer says
The Territory’s Treasurer has pitched a new plan in Alice Springs, which could see government owned public housing ‘beyond economic repair’ sold off. Find out more.
Government owned public houses “beyond economic repair” in Alice Springs and Darwin could be sold off under a new proposal pitched by the Territory’s Treasurer.
Bill Yan, CLP Namatjira MLA and current government Treasurer, announced the plan in Alice Springs on Friday morning at a Property Council of Australia NT (PCA NT) breakfast.
“After lots of arm twisting with (the department of) housing, I got the agreement from them just the start of this week for the first house – so (the department of) housing are going to release one house,” he said.
“Now I’ve gotta go away and do the work as to what that looks like: how do we hand that over and put it out to market to the building industry?”
Under the plan, the first home – in Alice Springs – will be put to the market for construction companies so they can “get out and get on with rebuilding that stock”, Mr Yan said.
The impetus for the plan stemmed from housing availability issues in Central Australia and Alice Springs, Mr Yan said, who also hinted public homes in Darwin could be part of the plan.
The exact number of how many “beyond economic repair” public houses would potentially hit the market was not given by Mr Yan when he made the announcement on Friday.
Nor was a figure given for how much the public houses could sell for.
But the builders could do as they please with the houses once bought, Mr Yan said, telling the crowd they could be demolished and turned into units, or just refurbished.
A government spokeswoman downplayed the Treasurer’s plan Friday morning after Mr Yan made his announcement, calling it a “pilot program” which stemmed from a ministerial meeting with government housing minister Steve Edgington.
The meeting led to a “preliminary agreement” being made to “explore the viability of the asset recycling scheme in the new year,” the spokeswoman said.
The funding from the sold houses would be put towards investing in more public houses, according to the spokeswoman, if the plan was put in place.
The Department of Housing, Local Government, and Community Development directed this masthead to the spokeswoman’s response when sent questions about how many public houses could be sold and what their sale price could be.
Friday’s breakfast, put on by the PCA NT, was for the launch of the council’s newly released “Growing Central Australia” report.
One key recommendation from the report, which was developed in partnership between PCA NT and Genexa Advisory, was investing in more housing and enabling infrastructure in Central Australia.
PCA NT executive director Ruth Palmer told the more than 50 attendees at the breakfast “we need to stimulate the Territory’s housing supply”.
“It’s really important that we get the builders, the construction workers, talking with CDU and the government around what they need because that’s what’s going to be important,” she said.
“You’re not going to grow anything without that housing supply.”
Originally published as NT government-owned public houses in Alice Springs, Darwin to hit the market, Treasurer says
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