Homelessness in Mildura doubles despite undercount

Despite nearly doubling over the last six years, a Mildura support service believes homelessness is still underreported in the region. Read why.

A Mildura support service believes the latest government data is far off the number of people who are actually experiencing homelessness in the region.

New data released last week by the Australian Bureau of Statistics estimates 348 people are homeless in Mildura, as of the 2021 census count.

That’s nearly double the last estimate of 175 people in 2016.

However Mallee Accommodation and Support chief executive Vincent Wilson said the number was, if not a undercount, then an underrepresentation of the total homeless population.

Homeless people sleeping rough. 1st April 2023 Picture David Clark

“Just in Mildura alone, not even counting the surrounding towns, we have just under 1000 people on the waitlist for social housing,” he said.

“Looking at the ABS data there certainly is a doubling there, but they are relatively low [numbers] comparatively …

“The ABS data doesn’t really take into account people that are couch surfing or live in caravan parks full time.”

Mr Wilson said the other concerning figure was people in housing stress.

“In 2016, 10 per cent of houses in Mildura were paying more than 30 per cent of their income on rent and in 2021 it’s 30 per cent …

“That’s a tripling of the number of people with mental stress, those are people moving towards that precipice of getting to needing social housing.”

These numbers are part of the reason that deputy mayor Helen Healy has put housing affordability at the top of her priorities.

“It is top of the agenda for me, I have personal involvement with people in this situation so I’m very committed to getting things moving,” she said.

Cr Healey said while a task force had been established to address the issue, the council was leaving it to experts in the field to handle.

“We were aware it was a growing problem, so a task force was ratified in February, ” she said.

“The business of the task force is to address the issue as a group – all the members are the key players in the field.

“It’s bringing the brains trust into the room so they can make recommendations.”