Jaensch must take advice

The challenge for Housing Minister Roger Jaensch and his bureaucrats is to ensure today’s homeless crisis meeting does not become a talkfest with no outcomes.

Housing Minister Roger Jaensch

SO after almost a full week of editorials and front page stories in the Mercury urging him to do something about the homelessness crisis, Housing Minister Roger Jaensch will today sit down with service providers — and his political opponents — to develop a response to help those in critical need of support right now. This is a very welcome development indeed, and Minister Jaensch deserves to be commended for it. We do so.

The challenge now will be for Mr Jaensch and his bureaucrats to ensure today’s meeting does not become a talkfest with no outcomes. As we have been reporting all week, we are now firmly into winter and there are still many hundreds of people in Hobart in need of urgent shelter.

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At the Mercury, we are the first to admit we have no personal expertise in this area of frontline support. But, to be frank, neither does Minister Jaensch. And so we urge him to listen carefully today to what he is told by the delegates from the Tasmanian Council of Social Service, Shelter Tasmania and Colony 47.

The next challenge will then be him to lead the preparation of that advice into a submission for Cabinet. And then it will be up to the Cabinet to pull its finger out and approve whatever measures the group has come up with. This is important.

Service providers tell us there are maybe close to 100 people in Hobart with complex needs who slept rough last night. Beyond that group are hundreds more who — thanks to the rental boom — are unable to afford any more to put a roof over their heads. These are people who will never qualify for social housing. They are people probably very much like you, who are just down on their luck. Maybe their relationship has broken up. Perhaps they just can’t get enough hours at work. Maybe their lease ran out, or their rent went up by too much. Whatever the reason, they are now in limbo. And this government appears blind to their situation. That is a shame.

Yes, these problems are all symptoms of the “growing pains” that Treasurer Peter Gutwein often talks about — the “side effects” of a booming economy. But that doesn’t mean the Government should wash its hands. Instead, the government and its ministers should stop saying “we have a plan” and instead listen to the advice of the community groups on the frontline — and also the experts in its own bureaucracy.

Ministers Jaensch and Gutwein need to be open to listen, and to do things differently. And Premier Will Hodgman needs to show much stronger leadership on these matters, too.

As we have said a few times in this column this week already, the Government’s plan to support increased housing stock and to invest in more public housing might well be a solid one for the medium term. But there are many hundreds of residents of our capital city who are doing things seriously tough. Does the Premier really think it’s OK that in the Hobart he loves that a bunk bed is now valued — according to ads on Gumtree at least — at $160 a week, and hallways where you can put a mattress at $75? Surely not.

Here’s an idea: perhaps the Premier should scrub his diary clean today and attend Minister Jaensch’s meeting with stakeholders. Now that would show leadership, and also that he cares.