Melbourne tower residents launch class action against government’s plan to demolish

Anxious Melbourne public housing residents have taken their fight to court, claiming the state had kept them in the dark about its demolition plans and breached their human rights.

Public housing residents have launched a class action against the State Government over its plan to demolish 44 towers.

The Victorian Government last year announced that it would demolish the Melbourne towers and privatise the majority of the land as part of its Housing Statement, sparking fears thousands of residents would be displaced.

Former premier Daniel Andrews in September declared that Melbourne’s 44 public housing towers would be knocked down and rebuilt to cater to three-times as many residents, otherwise they would cost $2.3 billion, or $55m per tower, to maintain over 20 years.

He did not say how much it would cost to rebuild them.

Resident Barry Berih is the lead plaintiff in the class action, which appeared on the Supreme Court public register on Thursday afternoon.

One of the towers at 141 Nicholson Street Carlton will be demolished to make way for social and affordable housing. Picture : NCA NewsWire / Nicki Connolly

Mr Berih, who has lived in a North Melbourne tower for 25 years which is among the first slated for demolition, said “the decision had taken an emotional and physical toll on me and my community”.

“The government didn’t consult with us or tell us about the decision. We found out from the media,” he said.

“We are still being kept in the dark. The government keeps telling public housing residents that they have plans, but they still haven’t told us what the plans are. I don’t know where I am going to be living or where I might end up, and the government isn’t giving us the information we need to make decisions.”

Residents say they were consulted and they found out about the decision through the media. Picture : NCA NewsWire / Nicki Connolly

Inner Melbourne Community Legal chief executive Elisa Buggy said the decision had breached the residents’ human rights.

“Public housing residents have human rights, too - the right to live free from arbitrary or unlawful interference with home and with family, the right to have families protected, the right to have the best interests of children be protected, property rights, and the right to security,” Ms Buggy said.

The class action, which names Housing Minister Harriet Shing and Homes Victoria as defendants, calls for the demolition decision to be quashed, a declaration that it was invalid due to jurisdictional error and an injunction.

Leader of the Victorian Greens Samantha Ratnam supports the residents’ class action. Picture: NCA NewsWire / David Crosling

Leader of the Victorian Greens Samantha Ratnam backed the class action and said she’d spoken with dozens of residents about the plan who were “confused, heartbroken and want answers”.

Ms Ratnam said the residents were “people who have called these towers home for decades and do not want to be displaced from their community”.

“Labor’s mass privatisation of public housing is making the housing crisis worse,” Ms Ratnam said.

“There are over 120,000 people on the public housing wait list in Victoria yet this government’s solution is to knock down all of our towers and hand the majority of the land over to private developers with no commitment to rebuild public housing.”

Ms Ratnam said if the demolition and privatisation went ahead, “it could mean the end of public housing in Victoria”.

She expected the court case was one of many actions that would be taken to stop the plan.

A Government spokeswoman called the tower redevelopment “the largest urban renewal project in Australia’s history – a project that will benefit Victorians for decades to come and increase social housing across the redevelopment program by at least 10 per cent”.

“The towers fail against noise, sustainability, waste and recycling, bedroom area dimensions, room depth, ventilation, private open space, accessibility and minimum amenity standards.”