Planning processes blamed for NSW’s social housing crisis

The Housing Minister says one “dysfunctional” process is to blame as more than 50,000 households in NSW are on the waiting list to secure affordable rentals.

Planning delays have been blamed for NSW social housing crisis, as more than 50,000 vulnerable household languish on waitlists for homes.

NSW Housing Minister Rose Jackson blasted the current processes as “dysfunctional,” with delays present at both a local and state government level.

However, Ms Jackson said she was “absolutely committed” to reforming the roadblocks to increase social housing supply.

“It should not be taking as long as it does to get planning approval for medium-density, good quality and affordable housing,” she said, speaking after an event with community housing provider, Link Wentworth.

“The planning system from top to bottom when it comes to social housing is dysfunctional and too slow.”

The NSW Housing Minister wants to end planning bottlenecks to increase social housing stock. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Bianca De Marchi

Ms Jackson said Planning Minister Paul Scully was “open and reflective” of speeding up approvals of social and affording housing, and flagged meaningful changes could be expected over the “next few months”.

“We are talking regularly about what we can do – once we get land identified – to get the planning pathways cleared up to actually start the housing delivery,” she said.

“It’s going to be a massive task.”

This comes as the federal government is attempting to pass a $10bn Housing Australia Future Fund which will build 30,000 new social and affordable housing properties over the first five years.

Ms Jackson said while it wasn’t enough to fix the crisis, NSW could stand to receive about 15,000 to 160,000 homes under the plan.

Housing Minister Rose Jackson said current planning processes for social housing was ‘dysfunctional.’ Picture: NCA NewsWire/ Gaye Gerard

Link Wentworth chief executive officer Andrew McAnulty welcomed collaboration with the government, however, he said planning delays was the main barrier to increasing supply.

“This is a problem that is 40 years in the making. We need good planning policy and good housing policy,” he said.

“The state government needs to improve planning processes to speed up the approval for social and affordable housing. So planning reform has to happen.

“There’s no point getting reform from the federal government if we can’t get projects approved.”

A report released by Link Wentworth on Tuesday made recommendations including streamlining planning processes, boosting shared ownership schemes and adopting different approaches for funding for social housing.

There are currently more than 50,000 households waitlisted for social housing provisions. Picture: NCA NewsWire/ Nikki Short

According the most recent figures from Shelter NSW, 57,550 households were on the waitlist for social housing in June 2022, which includes bids for government-operated public housing, and community housing.

The pain was most acutely felt in southwestern Sydney, where the waitlist ballooned to 10,641 in 2022

NSW Premier Chris Minns has issued a directive to all government departments to identify surplus land to rezone for housing, with a 30 per cent target for public, community and affordable housing.

An audit is under way with a report expected within months.