Want to fix the housing crisis? Then listen to dads like Morgan

There are many social issues that look very different from the bottom of the socioeconomic heap than they look when you’re nearer the top. Housing is very much in this category. Yet the insights from the ground level, when they are passed up, are mostly ignored. They often sit awkwardly with the policy envelope available to politicians – not because they’re unworkable, but because they’re politically unsayable.

On Monday evening, ABC Q&A viewers heard one voice from the crunchiest end of the widely recognised housing crisis. Audience member Morgan Cox stood up and made himself vulnerable in front of the entire nation. The Central Coast father of a one-year-old told the panel that his rent had gone up $180 a week – nearly $10,000 a year – and despite working two jobs, he’s worried about being able to ensure his family has somewhere to live. Morgan described the experience of going to look at prospective rentals and being outnumbered – and eventually outbid – by recent immigrants. I was on the panel, but I didn’t get to respond to that question.

If I had, there are a number of things I might have said about housing and disadvantage. One is that, when you’re at the bottom end of the market, things that look small from further up can have a massive impact.

Immigration is one of them. Statistics show immigrants increasing our gross domestic product and, at least in the aggregate, making us a more prosperous nation. Due to shortages of workers in construction, among other things, Australia is bringing in workers from overseas.

But statistics don’t keep a roof over your family’s head. When you’re not earning much, the migrants who are also struggling to get a toehold in their new country are your direct competition. And limited available housing stock makes the equation literally zero-sum – when one family secures one of the rare places to live in a limited price range, another family does not.

Rent rose $180 a week: Morgan Cox on the ABC’s Q&A.Credit: ABC

Migrants aren’t Morgan’s only competition, but they stand out to him because it is a policy choice to allow them to settle in Australia. The predicament of the badly off is worsened when numbers increase at the bottom of the socioeconomic pyramid.

A better answer for Morgan from the panel would have been to differentiate between the executives and international students who come and go, and the longer-term visa program that claims to be skills-based but which Morgan can see lets in lots of unskilled labour. Morgan, working two jobs, is probably in competition with the unskilled for work as well as housing. Of course, it is inexplicable to Morgan that our society should extend compassion to people from other countries while shrugging off his plight. After all, he would also like to build a better life in Australia.

Morgan may or may not be aware of another way in which political decisions limit the housing available to him and others struggling financially. Namely, it’s the poor management of social housing that reduces the number of people who can be accommodated as well as reducing the housing available to those who don’t qualify for public support.

Sydney City councillor Lyndon Gannon is one of the few people in policy who have seen how this works from personal experience. Growing up in the inner Sydney suburb of Glebe, Gannon had many friends who lived in public housing. Some of his family still do. But precisely because of this direct experience, Gannon is frustrated by those who, as he says, “game the system” to keep hold of bigger houses than they need, or remain in public housing despite earning an income.

Gannon tells me about public housing tenants he knows who influenced their children to enrol in full-time courses they had no intention of undertaking so they’d continue to count as dependents, allowing their parents to remain in family-size houses.

The problem of under-utilisation of space in social housing is known to the state government. NSW Housing Minister Rose Jackson’s office is quick to deliver the best numbers available to it: as of June 30, 2023, more than 16,000 (17 per cent) of all social housing tenancies were classified as under-occupied, with two or more bedrooms than the households needed.

“This usually occurs,” according to the information provided, “as a result of household members moving out of the property during the life of the tenancy.” Recognising and acknowledging the problem is an important step to solving it, so kudos to the minister for that.

Typically for a political office, the quotes I’m offered also take a swipe at the previous government for “mismanagement”. But it’s far from clear that the failings in public housing are unique to one or the other political denomination. Rather, they seem to belong to the political class as a whole. As Gannon points out, when one government or another is trying to fix public housing, which often means moving tenants into other accommodation and selling off valuable stock to build or buy more, opportunistic political types will “latch onto” existing tenants and turn their cause into a political campaign against their opponents.

Despite local government having no part in creating or managing social housing – which is mainly state-owned and sometimes boosted with federal funding – local councillors often use the issue to generate political capital. Where they succeed, or their potential campaigns act as a deterrent to change, inner-city housing, including multi-bedroom houses with gardens in areas that would allow people like Morgan to balance family and work, are left to moulder and become unlivable.

Until the losers of these political calculations on immigration and social housing find a way to be heard beyond a few minutes on a talk show, this injustice will continue. Housing is already a key issue for voters. To fix it, we will have to agree to see what’s happening at the bottom of the socioeconomic pyramid.

Parnell Palme McGuinness is managing director at campaigns firm Agenda C. She has done work for the Liberal Party and the German Greens.

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