The number of homeless people in your suburb revealed

Sydney’s worsening housing crisis has been laid bare as new figures reveal the number of people receiving homelessness services has soared over the past nine years and NSW Housing Minister Rose Jackson warns the “face of homelessness is changing”.

A week after Treasurer Daniel Mookhey said Sydney was at risk of having a homelessness problem on the scale of San Francisco’s and that, without remedy, rising rental costs could push the middle class into destitution, new data shows the problem’s extent in Sydney.

Analysis of Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) data undertaken by Homelessness NSW shows almost 24,000 people in Sydney were receiving homelessness services last financial year. The City of Sydney local government area recorded the highest number with 2777 people, followed by Blacktown (2753), Campbelltown (2274), Penrith (2254) and Canterbury-Bankstown (2063).

During 2022-23, the Inner West area had an increase of 20 per cent to nearly 1500 people receiving help followed by Canterbury-Bankstown.

In Sydney’s eastern suburbs, the Waverley LGA experienced a 22 per cent jump, albeit off a considerably lower base. On the north shore, Ku-ring-gai had a 27 per cent jump in demand for services.

Mookhey used an address last week to warn Sydney could end up looking like San Francisco – where the homeless camp in tents in view of city hall – without considerable intervention to lift housing supply. Middle-class workers in suits in the Californian city live in homeless shelters and are forced to rely on food stamps.

NSW Treasurer Daniel Mookhey says the housing crisis needs to be addressed now.Credit: Dominic Lorrimer

“Homelessness is claiming the middle class in San Francisco,” he said.

“To be fair to San Francisco, they’re trying to do something about it, but their points of intervention are coming very late. That is creating great stress to their social cohesion. We still have a point in time in which we can make better choices.”

Under National Housing Accord targets agreed upon last August, NSW needs to build 378,000 new homes by July 2029. The government’s proposed reforms will bring significant uplift to around eight major transport hubs, and there will be rezoning in a 400-metre radius around another 31 train stations.

Jackson said the AIHW data was heartbreaking but not surprising and the housing crisis was changing the face of homelessness.

NSW Minister for Housing Rose Jackson blasted local mayors last week for “playing NIMBY politics” ahead of the local government elections.Credit: Dominic Lorrimer

“We have people with jobs, long rental histories, and no previous history of homelessness unable to get access to housing,” she said. “This is the harsh reality that thousands of people across NSW are experiencing right now,” she said.

A week after she accused some Sydney mayors of engaging in “misleading” and “fearmongering” campaigns against the proposed housing reforms, Jackson took aim again.

She noted Canterbury-Bankstown Council had “more than doubled the number” of people presenting to a specialised homelessness service provider since 2015, while Fairfield LGA has had a 75 per cent increase in the same period.

“The data is clear; people need housing that is affordable. This is especially true in councils opposing more housing,” she said.

Last Wednesday, Independent Fairfield Mayor Frank Carbone said plans to allow dual occupancy on properties would turn “west Sydney into Kolkata” and end backyard cricket. Canterbury-Bankstown Mayor Bilal El-Hayek claimed the suite of reforms would result in “rabbit warrens, bottlenecks and frustrated drivers”.

Homelessness NSW chief executive Dom Rowe called on the state government to boost funding for specialist homelessness services in line with Queensland’s recent 20 per cent boost, while urgently building more social and affordable homes to slash the “57,000-strong, decade-long waitlist and end NSW’s homelessness crisis”.

“It’s quite scary. There are lots of families across NSW and in Sydney, who are just one energy bill or rate rise away from home insecurity,” she said. “Right now, one out of every two people seeking help for homelessness in NSW do not receive it because underfunded services are full.”