Housing in remote Aboriginal communities
Little has been mentioned on the blogosphere about the Australian government’s approach to housing in remote Aboriginal communities. We want to get a conversation going, so this is a start 
In Kevin Rudd’s apology speech on the 13th Feb, he acknowledged that “a business as usual approach towards Indigenous Australians is not working”. He insisted that he would like the new parliament to allow flexible, tailored and local approaches to achieve commonly agreed national objectives. On the subject of housing, he made the proposition for:
… a joint policy commission, to be led by the Leader of the Opposition and me, with a mandate to develop and implement—to begin with—an effective housing strategy for remote communities over the next five years. It will be consistent with the government’s policy framework, a new partnership for closing the gap.
A week after this announcement (i.e. yesterday), Kevin Rudd visited a remote NSW Aboriginal community — without the opposition leader Brendan Nelson (who rejected an invitation to join Kevin Rudd, claiming that the visit was a media stunt) — to begin the development of the government’s new housing strategy.
Federal Housing and Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny Macklin also announced that the government will spend an additional $20 million in 2008 on upgrading housing in remote Aboriginal communities in the NT.
“[It’s] particularly addressed to upgrades to existing houses,” she told the ABC. “This money is aimed to fix waterproofing wet areas, fixing kitchens, replacing gutters and cleaning out rainwater tanks.”
“We really do need to continue the very important work to fix houses so they’re more appropriate and healthier for Indigenous people.”
The Age reports that Jennt Macklin also told the National Housing Conference her government supported Aboriginal aspirations for home ownership. The Labor government has confirmed they will continue to allow traditional owners to obtain a 99-year lease.
The Australian reported that senior Labor Indigenous leader Warren Mundine maintains that home ownership by traditional owners is essential to lifting Aboriginal people out of poverty. Other Indigenous leaders disagree — Tom Calma, the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner, maintains that Aboriginal people need time to catch up in other areas of society first.
The Sydney Morning Herald last Saturday (16 Feb) published a piece that suggested this project must start with an understanding of what the concept of home means:
If the bipartisan commission on indigenous disadvantage is achieve its first goal and tackle decrepit and overcrowded housing in a sustainable way, it will have to do more than build new homes in remote and regional communities. It will have to teach indigenous people to build them and not presume to know where they want them.
More information
- [info] Housing resources - ANTaR
- [info] Healthhabitat - “Healthabitat aims at improving people’s living environment and consequently their health. The work has focused on Australian indigenous people where the need has been greatest. The principles and practical techniques extend from immediate fix work of urgent faults in housing through to research and development projects that can contribute to longer term change.”
Priscilla Brice-Weller is the Online Campaign Coordinator at ANTaR. Priscilla is a non-Indigenous contributor who posts links on current affairs, adding context to the other posts on this blog. Photo credit: Michael Efford.
February 23rd, 2008 at 1:41 am
Well, this looks promising but there is still no guarantee. Throwing money at the situation may help - but it may just get eaten up along the way. I just hope that Aboriginal people get to decide how they would like to set up “home” not some government official.
March 11th, 2008 at 3:10 pm
The essential problem with Indigenous housing policy to date has been the supply of buildings designed for nuclear families. This is one of the main causes of overcrowding.
There are two aspects of overcrowding. One is that there are not enough houses but the other is that often groups of 10, 20, 30 people may choose to live together and their only option to do so is to squueze everyone into a space designed for mum. dad and 2 and a half kids. This is also a major cause of the rapid disintegration of buildings, every hinge, tap and window is subjected to many times the workload of the average nuclear family home.
The housing bureacrats in their wisdom then started building bigger and stronger houses. Kitchens that could feed 12 instead of 4. Bedrooms that can sleep 4 instead of 1 or 2. Massive doors with massive hinges. lounges and verandahs big enough for the whole mob to sit around. But this has only institutionalised the overcrowding, everyone is still in each others space and face all day every day. They are bigger homes but they are still the same old nuclear family architecture.
The answer (I reckon) is smaller buildings, lots of cabins surrounding a centre building. Close enough to be connected but seperate enough for everyone to have their own headspace, just like the old fasioned gunyas around a camp fire. A decentralisation of architecture allows for the natural process of womens and mens business too, rather than everyone sharing the same space all the time.
Money, money, money. At present there is unspent millions set aside for reparing and building houses that sits in bank accounts and has done for years. Governments brag about how much is allocated to Aboriginal housing, but much of it is just a figure in an account book. This money needs to not just be increased, but some mechanism needs to be constructed that can actually spend it on the ground. The political pressure of the housing crisis in places like Palm Island have forced a bit of spending here and there, mainly overdue maintenance, but the general constipation of housing bureacracies has retained much of the presently available cash.
The major obstacle to more houses is lack of land title on which to build them.
Some may find these interesting…..
An example of the problem…….
Palm Island Housing Report
“Doing Housing”
http://www.kalkadoon.org/index.php/palm-island-housing-report/
A report on housing issues on Palm Island from an Aboriginal perspective
for non-Aboriginal policy makers. Prepared by kalkadoon.org for the Queensland Greens March 2006.
A solution?
“Out of the box. A vision for housing”
http://www.kalkadoon.org/index.php/out-of-the-box-housing-vision/
- a hypothetical model written to provoke discussion, not as a blueprint. It is based on - the N.T.’s Central Land Council’s policy of communal land ownership and private home ownership, eco-village design principles, and the specific circumstances of the communities of Palm Island and Boulia in Qld,