The big brown stain on the WA government’s housing efforts

You need look no further than a 25-hectare parcel of land in the heart of Bentley, nine kilometres from Perth’s CBD, to understand why the West Australian government has failed to keep up with the demand for social and affordable housing.

The site between Drummond and Pollock streets known as Brownlie Towers was an example used by Labor as it huffed and puffed about remedying the previous government’s inaction before demolishing the housing complex in 2019.

The old Brownlie Towers site.Credit: Bentley 360

Former housing minister Peter Tinley left voters in no doubt when provided a Dorothy Dixer during question time in the state parliament on April 12, 2018 by Labor MP Cassie Rowe.

She referred to the “unprecedented revitalisation of the area” and how it will “create jobs, deliver affordable housing”.

Tinley, a former army officer with a booming voice, rose to his feet and began eviscerating his political enemy.

Brownlie Towers was built in the 1970s to house 300 public housing apartments Credit: Housing Authority

“The McGowan government will get on with the failures of the former Liberal-National government and do what it could not do in 8½ years,” the then-minister proclaimed.

“We will activate a 25-hectare site and create between 1500 and 2500 dwellings. We have rebadged it and called it Bentley 360. We are going out to expressions of interest in the very near future to find a joint venture partner for a multimillion-dollar project.”

He went on to say that MPs had undoubtedly heard similar promises made for the Brownlie Towers site before, but this time the commitment was unwavering.

More than six years on, and the government has done absolutely nothing.

Take a look online at a satellite image of the vast area of land so close to the city centre and all you’ll see is a big brown stain on Labor’s housing policies. So much talk, so much money and so little to show for it.

New Housing Minister John Carey blames the pandemic for stalling any redevelopment.

But that’s just an excuse, because everyone remembers how Labor went out of its way to ensure the homebuilding and construction sectors stayed fully operational during COVID.

Reporters regularly attended press conferences on home and apartment construction sites to hear former premier Mark McGowan announce hundreds of millions of dollars more in building grants, rebates and concessions for new property buyers.

That taxpayers’ money benefited elements of the private building industry while the government failed to roll up its own sleeves and ensure public housing needs would be met.

WA Planning Minister John Carey.

If redeveloping the Brownlie Towers site was so crucial in 2018, why wasn’t it a matter of urgency for a government in 2020 or 2021?

COVID provided it with the licence to spend money on keeping housing construction alive in WA, but the government failed to use that licence to follow through on its own promises.

Instead, the Brownlie Towers saga is back to the drawing board complete with a new line of spin from the government.

“Bentley redevelopment project moves into streamlined delivery,” was the headline on a press release in February.

What does that even mean?

“A new masterplan for the former Brownlie Towers site in Bentley will be developed in consultation with the local community and relevant stakeholders,” Carey said.

He claimed the pandemic had “changed the economics in delivering large-scale redevelopments”.

Well, Metronet and the billions of dollars in cost blowouts his government is prepared to absorb suggests otherwise.

Decode Carey’s new Brownlie Towers mantra and what you really have is a question of priorities. The redevelopment was a prime concern in 2018, when Tinley wanted to score political points. It’s just a stone in the government’s shoe now.

How Carey, in 2024, can re-heat some of Tinley’s hollow words though is cynical to say the least.

“These are the first steps towards the creation of an inclusive community at Bentley, as part of an important broader urban regeneration project,” he said.

First steps? They were promised in 2018, minister.

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