Internet Edition Issue 2
May 2005

Editorial

Viewpoint

Cyclone Strikes Kalumburu

Managing Diabetes At Warmun

From the Office of Justice, Ecology & Peace

KCP Magazine

HOUSING STORTAGE STILL CRITICAL
By Br Shane Wood cfc

Housing has been a ‘hot topic’ in the Kimberley for as long as I have been here (since 1998) and was probably one before that. It appears to me that the issue is still bubbling away, if not getting worse.

This is a multi-layered issue – like most other issues in the Kimberley, it is never simple. In this instance, I would like to focus on the provision of affordable housing for low-income local people in Kimberley towns. I sense that there is a level of justifiable anger about the opening up of sizeable tracts of land for housing developers but a continuing
Lengthening of the queue for a Homeswest house.

According to the information supplied by the Regional Manager of the government department responsible for the supply of Homeswest housing, there will be around 30 new houses either built or ‘spot purchased’ in the current financial year. In the same period around 5 houses will be sold off. Leaving a net gain of around 25 houses across all
Kimberley towns. This is in a total population (including communities) of around 31,000 people (at the time of the last census in 2001). There were some 13,000 private dwellings in 2001.

In the period between 1996 and 2001 census dates, the population of the Kimberley had increased by around 8,000 people. We can be fairly safe in assuming a similar figure at least as an increase since 2001. So, as an average, we can say that around 25% of that increase is made up of indigenous people. The majority of those eligible for Homeswest housing are in this part of the population. So we could estimate that 2,000 extra people (in addition to those already on the long waiting list) are expected to be housed in the 100 extra houses provided since 2001.

It becomes clear from these projections that the government has not, and is not, making enough of an investment in low cost housing to the growing Kimberley population. As we all know and acknowledge, housing is a basic human right guaranteed under the United Nations Charter, along with the right to food, water, education and work.

Now that the election is over, and having been told, during the campaign, that the government coffers are in very good shape, it is time for the elected representatives for the Kimberley to begin to deliver on this basic right. It is surely a sad reflection on our society when those born and raised in a remote region cannot find suitable basic housing while some,
including the government through taxes, can continue to reap the rewards of an increasing population of newcomers and tourists.

Overcrowding in existing housing especially amongst indigenous residents produces flow-on consequences related to health, welfare and law and order that can end up being far more expensive in financial and human terms than the outlay required for the provision of more basic but decent housing. The newly returned Government has four years to make amends for past neglect in this area

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