Resourced: http://www.smh.com.au/interactive/2014/millers-point/
Residents have vowed to "fight to the end" as market forces threaten Millers Point's maritime past, writes Nicole Hasham.
If the state government’s plan goes without a hitch, every public housing tenant at Millers Point - old and young, disgruntled and willing - will soon be gone. Sydney, a city that erases relics from its waterfront with unnerving ease, may scarcely miss a beat.
Residents will move to suburbs such as Ultimo and Leichhardt, Tweed Heads and Dubbo. Some will find relief in new ground-floor flats without perilous stairs, or have their family nearby. Others will feel lost, separated from neighbours they have known since birth.
Almost overnight, Australia’s first public housing site will become a prestige address, and homes built for wharfies will be fitted with en suites, atriums and entertaining decks.
Community Services Minister Gabrielle Upton says NSW will be better off.
"This is a fair outcome. The proceeds from the sale … can make sure that we provide more homes for more tenants [and] invest in the upgrade of other public housing stock," she said.
“There are 58,000 households in NSW who don’t currently have public housing and they deserve that opportunity.”
58,000 families on the waiting list for public housing in NSW
The government’s argument - that rental subsidies and maintenance costs at Millers Point are too high, and sale proceeds will improve the ailing public housing system - has convinced some observers that the properties should be sold.
But others say deeper issues are at play: how gentrification and market forces diminish social equality, and what happens to the soul of a city inhabited only by the wealthy.
“What’s happening here is social cleansing. We are a city that has working class roots – and to destroy those roots and sell off a piece of history, we are going to suffer in the long term,” Sydney MP Alex Greenwich said.
“Any global city needs people at all income levels to help that city thrive. And the general vibe here will change, from one of diversity and tolerance to … McMansions throughout our inner city. ”
The swift, wholesale nature of the Millers Point sell off, along with properties at the Rocks, has also perturbed some.
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| Our city shouldn’t be a place that only has space for the wealthy. Does [this] announcement mean all inner city social housing like in Glebe or Woolloomooloo ... is also under threat? The community of Millers Point deserves better than this.” Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore |
Our city shouldn’t be a place that only has space for the wealthy. Does [this] announcement mean all inner city social housing like in Glebe or Woolloomooloo ... is also under threat? The community of Millers Point deserves better than this.”
Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore
Four months into the relocation process, less than one-quarter of 393 households had accepted offers of new homes. If the government’s timetable is to be met, it has a little over 18 months to move the remaining households and sell 300 properties, while getting a good return for taxpayers.
Some residents, such as Flo Seckold, 81, are refusing to budge.
“I am not going. I was born here and I don’t want to go,” said Mrs Seckold, who was recently widowed and is the daughter of maritime workers.
“At my age, how can I go out and start a new life, where I don’t know anybody?”
465
the number of Millers Point residents to be relocated, from 206 properties
A further 125 residents will be evicted from nearby properties at the Sirius building and Gloucester St
It’s the only place I’ve ever known, this is where I grew up, this is my life. It will be a fight [to evict us] because we will have many many supporters. We don’t want violence, but we are prepared to go to jail.” Barney Gardner, aged in his 60s a life-long Millers Point resident
Dawn Caruana, who lost her husband and son in a car accident in 1979, said the community and her local church, St Brigid’s, have been a vital support system ever since.
“I’ll fight to the end with everyone else,” said Mrs Caruana, whose husband, John, worked as a stevedore at the Millers Point wharves.
“There is a community here and I don’t think it should be broken.”
I lost my husband and son in a car accident in 1979. The community was absolutely wonderful, the support never stopped. They rallied around, people brought food, cared for the kids. That’s what they do in this area, when anything like that happens. We are there for each other.” Dawn Caruana, who moved to Millers Point 48 years ago after marrying her now late husband, John
Ms Upton said the government’s relocation service was “working with each tenant and understanding those tenants’ needs … to find them better accommodation”.
“We are paying for relocation costs, we are paying for the re-establishment of utilities when those tenants move, and some have already moved to surrounding areas in Sydney,” she said.
But public historian Shirley Fitzgerald, co-author of
Millers Point: The Urban Village, asked why the oldest residents, some of whom are the last living links to the suburb’s working class past, cannot see out their days in the area - a move in line with the state’s own “age in place” policy.
“Its being done very brutally. There are very real human issues here,” she said.
“If the government were determined to [sell] its public housing, it could do it a bit more gently over a number of years and allow people to live out their lives.”
She warned that while heritage controls may preserve the look of Millers Point homes, most of which are more than a century old, “once the area goes to the well-heeled, you have lost the social significance of the place”.
No one wanted to know about this place when I was growing up. [Now] we are not good enough and it will be for the lah-de-dahs who don’t care about it, all they want is the harbour view.” Colin Tooher, the sixth generation of his family to grow up in Millers Point
Leases were traditionally passed down through low-paid maritime families, helping create a tight-knit community that has lasted through generations.
The tenant mix broadened when the Department of Housing took control of Millers Point in the mid-1980s.
In 2003, the entire suburb was listed on the state heritage register as a “living cultural landscape”. National Trust’s NSW president, Ian Carroll, does not oppose the sale, so long as homes are bought by “people who can restore them respectfully and in accordance with proper conservation plans”.
However, he said the wishes of long-term maritime descendants who wish to stay in the suburb should be heeded.
At the time of writing, six homes had been released for sale as the government tests buyer appetite. Some Millers Point properties could fetch more than $3 million, and there are estimates the sale will inject up to $500 million into the government’s coffers.
Average sale price of a Millers Point property under a limited sell-off by the previous Labor government.
$1.3m The current Coalition government expects higher prices this time around.
We know there are people who are passionate about living here and we want to make the move as easy as possible. But we are very pleased that we have come to the decision … to sell these properties in this magnificent area for the benefit of the entire social housing system.” Former Community Services Minister Pru Goward, announcing the sell-off
Ms Upton said selling every property was the fairest way to bolster the public housing system. However, Real Estate Institute of NSW president Malcolm Gunning said allowing some public housing tenants to remain at Millers Point could increase the value of other homes.
“Diversity ... actually improves property prices and the liveability of the area. It becomes a more interesting place to live," he said.
"If it becomes ‘prestige’, where you’ve got just all owner-occupiers, you tend to get a bit of sameness."
Mr Gunning said housing the wealthy next to those less fortunate was also "a great leveller – people become less pretentious".
A government-commissioned social impact assessment of the Millers Point sale said some proceeds should be used to build new social housing in the suburb, especially for older residents.
As Fairfax Media has revealed, a draft version of the assessment also emphasised that relocating elderly public housing residents could increase their risk of death. The warning was downplayed in the final version released by the government in March.
The government says the Millers Point proceeds will be reinvested into the social housing system, but there are fears the money will vanish into a gaping deficit rather than build new housing stock.
The NSW public housing system has run at average loss of $330 million since the early 1990s. Over the past decade, more than 9000 properties have been sold to fund replacements and maintenance.
$800,000 the estimated repair bill to restore the worst terrace houses to heritage standard
Mr Greenwich questioned why the government has not produced a business case for the sale, or explained how the public housing system will be made sustainable in the long term.
“This is a government which does not have a public or social housing policy, and uprooting a whole community as your justification for solving the public housing crisis ... no one is buying that,” he said.
If the government proceeds with the sale, Mr Greenwich said, community housing providers should be allowed to take over some properties, so a proportion of tenants can stay in the area.
If not, he predicts the government will still be trying to relocate public housing tenants in five or 10 years’ time.“I think the government has really underestimated the strong community sense here and their strong fight to stay in the area,” he said.
Among those sure to be manning the final barricade is Barney Gardner. The 65-year-old former shipping and council worker has lived in High Street his entire life, and says authorities will have to physically drag him and his neighbours out.“How is it going to look if the government comes through with a sheriff and starts forcibly evicting [elderly] people?” he said.
“This is our home. It’s an ongoing battle and it’s not going to go away.” With Leesha McKenny
