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The Building Blocks — Action to Close the Gap (Continued)

Closing the Gap: Healthy Homes

Housing is crucial to outcomes in all other areas of life. Children cannot grow up healthy and get a good education if their home environment is unsafe and overcrowded.

An Australian Institute of Health and Welfare report released in October 2009, Indigenous housing needs 2009: a multi-measure needs model, reveals the impact on Indigenous housing of decades of failed government policy and under-investment. The report found that around 10,000 additional dwellings were required at the time of the 2006 Census to tackle Indigenous housing disadvantage including homelessness, housing affordability and the deterioration of dwelling conditions across Australia. Indigenous people are under housing pressure from inner urban areas to very remote communities.

The Australian Government has made housing a major priority, in particular social housing for the disadvantaged and homeless. The National Partnership Agreement on Social Housing is providing $400.0 million to the States and Territories over two years from 2008‑09 and will increase social housing by around 1,900 dwellings by 2011. As at 31 December 2009, 23 Indigenous households are among the 488 households so far accommodated.

The Social Housing Initiative, part of the Nation Building Economic Stimulus Plan, is expanding access to social housing for all Australians, including Indigenous people living in regional and urban areas. Under this initiative, to which the Government has committed $5.6 billion over four years from 2008‑09, around 19,300 new social housing dwellings will be constructed by June 2012 and 70,000 existing social housing dwellings repaired. More than 1,400 dwellings already approved are expected to house Indigenous people.

The Australian Government is contributing $550.0 million over five years from 2008‑09 to the National Partnership Agreement on Homelessness. This initiative is working to reduce Indigenous homelessness by one third by 2013, as part of working towards the Australian Government's target of halving homelessness in Australia by 2020.

In remote areas Indigenous housing need is critical. Houses are likely to be overcrowded and in very poor condition. To address this situation the National Partnership Agreement on Remote Indigenous Housing is investing a total of $5.5 billion over 10 years to provide up to 4,200 new houses and 4,800 refurbished houses. Funding is also available for a repairs and maintenance program, assessing housing condition, tenancy management, improvements to town camps and the provision of employment-related accommodation.

Central to the agreement are major changes to the way housing is delivered in remote communities including:

• reforming land-tenure arrangements to ensure government investment is secured
• the development of better ways of managing new housing construction and refurbishment
• improving property and tenancy management practices, including provision for ongoing maintenance and the payment of rent at public housing levels
• building an Indigenous labour force through housing projects
• ensuring that local communities are consulted and housing activity meets local needs.

Progress is being made on land reform in the States to underpin investment through this National Partnership Agreement. In the Northern Territory, the Australian Government working with the Northern Territory Government has made significant progress with negotiation of leasehold arrangements on community owned land with Indigenous communities and land councils.

Appropriate tenure arrangements have been finalised or agreed in principle in 14 of the 16 sites identified for major capital works under the Strategic Indigenous Housing and Infrastructure Program (SIHIP), including whole of township leases for Nguiu in the Tiwi Islands, and for Angurugu, Umbakumba and Milyakburra on Groote Eylandt.  Additionally, secure tenure arrangements are now in place in all 18 Alice Springs town camps allocated to receive works under SIHIP.

In December 2009 COAG agreed to the renegotiation of the National Partnership Agreement on Remote Indigenous Housing and this has now been endorsed by all First Ministers who are parties to the Agreement. The renegotiation will enable a more competitive process for allocation of funding by the Australian Government for capital works and provide strong incentives for the States and the Northern Territory to progress the construction of new housing, refurbishment of existing houses and provision of employment related accommodation in remote Indigenous communities over the remaining eight years of the National Partnership Agreement. The new arrangements will begin on 1 July 2010.

COAG agreed to the renegotiation following consideration of progress on the implementation of the National Partnership by the States and the Northern Territory. Concern about slow progress on capital works had led the Australian Government to set up an Office of Remote Indigenous Housing in the Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs and to deploy staff to key jurisdictions to help oversee the rollout of this National Partnership Agreement.

Work agreed for the 2009‑10 financial year has continued. The target for 2009‑10 is for 320 new houses and 587 refurbishments to be completed.  There has been an improvement by the state and Northern Territory Governments in progressing this work. We are on track to achieving these targets with 320 new houses underway, 33 completed and more than 640 refurbishments also completed or underway. 

In the Northern Territory the Australian Government and Northern Territory Governments are jointly undertaking SIHIP as the first tranche of works under the National Partnership Agreement on Remote Indigenous Housing. By 2013, SIHIP will have delivered 750 new houses, 230 rebuilds of existing houses and 2,500 refurbishments across the Northern Territory. Two construction company consortia, known as 'alliances', are delivering the program.

Over the past year both governments have worked through a number of challenges arising from implementation of a remote housing program of unprecedented size. A major review of the program's performance in August 2009 confirmed that the program is on track to achieve its targets and made a number of recommendations for improvement. The SIHIP Post Review Assessment, conducted in March this year, found that all recommendations have been, or are in the process of being, implemented, including a stronger role for the Australian Government in managing the program.

In the Northern Territory, at the end of April 2010 the construction of over 80 new houses was underway, with seven completed. Over 180 existing houses had been refurbished or rebuilt and over 110 existing houses had refurbishments or rebuilds underway. In total, work on over 380 housing lots was underway or completed. The program's target of a minimum 20 per cent Indigenous on site workforce is being exceeded, with currently over 35 per cent of the National Partnership Agreement on-site workforce in the Northern Territory being Indigenous.

Under the Alice Springs Transformation Plan, a joint initiative between the Australian and Northern Territory Governments, SIHIP funds are being used for housing construction and upgrades. Progress has been swift since work was able to begin in early December 2009. The plan addresses the long-standing need to provide safe and well managed accommodation for the many Aboriginal residents of the town as well as people from remote communities who come to Alice Springs to visit or access services.

In February 2010, I announced construction of the Alice Springs Accommodation Park, a drug and alcohol free space that will house up to 150 visitors in a range of affordable accommodation options when it is completed in mid 2010. A number of other transitional accommodation facilities are being funded under the Nation Building Economic Stimulus Plan.

Following the town camp clean ups and the Fix and Make Safe program carried out in December and January, refurbishments of houses have commenced in Ilparpa and Palmers town camps and construction has started on six of the first of 85 new houses to be built as part of the Australian Government's $100.0 million investment in housing and infrastructure across the town camps. The construction has so far provided job opportunities for 15 local Aboriginal trainees who are now trade assistants with the Territory Alliance team.

The integration of the town camps into mainstream municipal services has begun. Wheelie bins have been delivered to dwellings in the town camps, and the Alice Springs Town Council commenced weekly rubbish collection in early March.

The Dog Control Program, which has seen more than 670 dogs removed from Alice Springs town camps since December 2008, will receive an extra $450,000 over two years from 2010‑11 under the Alice Springs Transformation Plan.

The Alice Springs Transformation Plan is also identifying gaps in service delivery and working to strengthen social services in areas such as alcohol rehabilitation, family support and early childhood services. With the transition to mainstream tenancy arrangements, where residents pay public housing rent, people will be supported through life skills training, tenancy-support programs and intensive case management.

Under the Transformation Plan, the Commonwealth and the Northern Territory Government have committed $3.0 million over three years from 2009‑10 for a new Communities for Children site being established in Alice Springs to provide intensive early-intervention programs to vulnerable families, with children aged from newborn to 12 years. The project will use a community development approach to provide better support to families and children, running in collaboration with the community and local service providers.

In addition, the Government is investing $51.7 million to improve water and wastewater services in 17 remote Indigenous communities across Australia, focusing on priority communities under the Remote Service Delivery National Partnership. The improvements will be funded from the National Water Security Plan for Cities and Towns, which provides $254.8 million over five years to cities or towns with fewer than 50,000 people to upgrade older water systems, install new infrastructure and support practical projects that save water or reduce water losses.

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