The truth about 'subsidies' at Millers Point and The Rocks
When the NSW State Government announced last week that it would sell all the social housing at Millers Point and The Rocks, it highlighted the issue of social housing 'subsidies' there. It gave the impression that taxpayers' money – and lots of it – is being paid to tenants. This is incorrect.
Said Minister Goward:
The Government's media release refers variously to subsidies 'paid' and 'funded by the NSW taxpayer', and 'received by' tenants, all in dollar amounts.
The truth is that not a dollar of money raised from taxpayers is paid to public housing tenants or otherwise credited to their rent accounts. Not one dollar. Tenants pay money to Housing NSW, not the other way around.
The subsidies to which the Minister refers are accounting entries. The 'subsidy' for each tenancy is the difference between the 'market rent' for the property as assessed by the NSW Land and Housing Corporation, and the rent actually paid by the tenant, rebated according to the usual rules of Housing NSW's system of income-related rents.
The market rent for a property does not reflect the cost to the NSW State Government of providing housing or related services at the property. The market rent for a property can go up – and hence the 'subsidy' go up – without any change in the housing being provided at the property, or in Housing NSW's costs. (Housing NSW need not account for 'market rents' at all – for decades the old Housing Commission accounted for 'economic rents', reflecting the historic cost of its properties, and income-related rebated rents.)
What actually does cost money at Millers Point is repairs and maintenance. We'll take the Minister at her word when she says that in the past two years $6.8 million has been spent on repairs and maintenance there. This is a lot less than the $8.89 million per annum in 'subsidies' that was not actually spent.
It is important to note too how much tenants have paid towards that real cost of housing. There are 409 social housing tenancies in the properties at Millers Point and The Rocks. We understand the average income-related rent paid is about $100 per week, so, over the past two years, tenants have paid about $4.25 million in rent – in other words, not quite two-thirds of the repair bill.
You can see the impression it's trying to make. Let's turn it around. Half of all public housing tenants are over 60 years of age. They are ageing in homes to which they are much attached in a supportive community and should be allowed to stay there. As for the younger half: of course most of them receive Centrelink payments, that's why Housing NSW picked them to be public housing tenants! (Most tenants in Millers Point were housed there through the usual way: applying (and waiting) for social housing. A significant minority, however, have been there since before it public housing, when the Maritime Services Board owned the houses and let them to people who worked on the harbour.)
Cracks two and three are leveled against two individual tenants. The media release does not give their names, but it does disclose the gender, age, street of residence, period of residence, family circumstances of each person, and the amount of the 'subsidy' each has 'received'. We'll not repeat those details here; their privacy has been infringed enough as it is. Disclosures of personal information about clients of government services have no place in Ministerial media releases.
Said Minister Goward:
Subsidies to tenants in the last year alone reached $8.89 million, with individual tenants receiving subsidies as high as $44,000 per annum. This compares to subsidies of $8,000 per year in Campbelltown, $7,000 in Gosford, and $11,000 in Wollongong. For every subsidised tenancy in Millers Point, the Government could assist 5 tenants in Warrawong, or 3.5 tenants in Newcastle or Minto.
The Government's media release refers variously to subsidies 'paid' and 'funded by the NSW taxpayer', and 'received by' tenants, all in dollar amounts.
The truth is that not a dollar of money raised from taxpayers is paid to public housing tenants or otherwise credited to their rent accounts. Not one dollar. Tenants pay money to Housing NSW, not the other way around.
The subsidies to which the Minister refers are accounting entries. The 'subsidy' for each tenancy is the difference between the 'market rent' for the property as assessed by the NSW Land and Housing Corporation, and the rent actually paid by the tenant, rebated according to the usual rules of Housing NSW's system of income-related rents.
The market rent for a property does not reflect the cost to the NSW State Government of providing housing or related services at the property. The market rent for a property can go up – and hence the 'subsidy' go up – without any change in the housing being provided at the property, or in Housing NSW's costs. (Housing NSW need not account for 'market rents' at all – for decades the old Housing Commission accounted for 'economic rents', reflecting the historic cost of its properties, and income-related rebated rents.)
What actually does cost money at Millers Point is repairs and maintenance. We'll take the Minister at her word when she says that in the past two years $6.8 million has been spent on repairs and maintenance there. This is a lot less than the $8.89 million per annum in 'subsidies' that was not actually spent.
It is important to note too how much tenants have paid towards that real cost of housing. There are 409 social housing tenancies in the properties at Millers Point and The Rocks. We understand the average income-related rent paid is about $100 per week, so, over the past two years, tenants have paid about $4.25 million in rent – in other words, not quite two-thirds of the repair bill.
*
It is bad enough that the Government's media release creates a misleading impression about subsidies in the social housing system generally and at Millers Point and The Rocks in particular. What's worse is that it takes a couple of other cracks at Millers Point and The Rocks tenants as a group and, in a couple of cases, individually.
Crack one, against Millers Point tenants:
Half of all public housing tenants in Millers Point are of working age (18-59), but 94% of tenants claim Centrelink benefits as their primary source of income.
You can see the impression it's trying to make. Let's turn it around. Half of all public housing tenants are over 60 years of age. They are ageing in homes to which they are much attached in a supportive community and should be allowed to stay there. As for the younger half: of course most of them receive Centrelink payments, that's why Housing NSW picked them to be public housing tenants! (Most tenants in Millers Point were housed there through the usual way: applying (and waiting) for social housing. A significant minority, however, have been there since before it public housing, when the Maritime Services Board owned the houses and let them to people who worked on the harbour.)
Cracks two and three are leveled against two individual tenants. The media release does not give their names, but it does disclose the gender, age, street of residence, period of residence, family circumstances of each person, and the amount of the 'subsidy' each has 'received'. We'll not repeat those details here; their privacy has been infringed enough as it is. Disclosures of personal information about clients of government services have no place in Ministerial media releases.
http://tunswblog.blogspot.com.au/2014/03/the-truth-about-subsidies-at-millers.html
No comments:
Post a Comment