I wrote on Friday how homelessness in Melbourne has risen dramatically over the past decade at the same time as the city’s population has ballooned by nearly one million people (26%), driven primarily by the federal government’s mass immigration ‘Big Australia’ policy:
Over the weekend, we received more confirmation of the homeless crisis hitting Melbourne via the release of the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare’s (AIHW) 2016-2017 report, which shows a dramatic surge in people seeking homeless services after being forced-out of their homes by rising housing costs. From Domain:
The number of Victorians evicted from their homes and seeking help from homelessness services has more than doubled in five years, during which time stamp duty collected by the state government almost doubled to $6 billion.
In the 2016-2017 financial year, 43,751 people sought assistance from charities and housing services because they had recently been evicted from their home, according to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. This was either through forcible eviction or rent or mortgage arrears.
The numbers have risen dramatically since 2012, when 17,930 people reported they had been evicted into homelessness…
Chief executive Jenny Smith said higher rents flowed on from higher house prices, impacting people on low incomes…
Ms Smith said the rental market was more competitive than ever, partly because people saving for a house deposit were also seeking the most affordable rentals.
“That is then reducing the number of properties available to people on low incomes, because people on middle incomes are renting them to save money to get into the mortgage market”…
The latest rental data from the Victorian Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) showed that Melbourne’s rental vacancy rate was just 2.1% as at the September quarter – well down from 3.2% in 2013, 2014 and 2015:
Worse, the proportion of new rental lettings ‘affordable’ to lower income households has fallen to just 5.9% – way down on the circa 30% recorded between 2000 and 2006, as well as the 12% recorded in 2012 and 2014:
This follows a collapse in the number of new rental lettings across the state:
This is pure evil by Australia’s policy makers. Not only has the federal government’s mass immigration policy robbed Melbourne’s youth of the opportunity to purchase a home, but it is driving up their cost of living via rents as well, forcing many people into homelessness.
