SAP203 - Analyzing Housing Policy in Australia: Social Protection

This essay provides an in-depth analysis of housing policy in Australia, focusing on its role in delivering social protection, particularly to vulnerable groups such as the mentally challenged, unemployed, homeless, and disabled. It examines the National Housing and Homelessness Agreement (NHHA) and other government initiatives aimed at increasing access to affordable and secure housing. The essay identifies factors both supporting and hindering the effectiveness of these policies, including changes in social security, rising prison populations, and the limited availability of subsidized housing. It highlights the increasing rates of homelessness and rental stress in major Australian cities, despite government efforts to address these issues. The essay concludes by emphasizing the need for ongoing reforms to ensure equitable access to housing and effective social protection for all Australians. Desklib offers a platform for students to explore similar assignments and past papers for academic support.

Running head: HOUSING POLICY IN AUSTRALIA
Housing Policy in Australia
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author note

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Introduction
A policy adopted under political or governmental setting for the welfare of the state is
known as the social policy. It is basically considered as the study of the social services. Social
policies influence the human welfare with help of legislation, guidelines, activities and
principles. It improves the quality of life of the people (Dss.gov.au, 2019). Social policy helps to
promote wellbeing through welfare system by redistribution of resources. Proper distribution of
rescores brings positive effects in the life of the people. It gives social protection for the people
of the society. It restores the security of the people through proper social policy. In order to,
provide social protection through social policy, government of Australia adopted housing policy
for the entire population of the country. It mainly facilitates the disadvantaged section of the
society. It provides them with social protection against the odd circumstances of the society. It
helps them in living a quality life by getting all the basic facilities (Carey & McLoughlin, 2016).
The housing policy of Australia mainly focuses on mentally challenged, unemployed, homeless
and disabled people. There are various attributes of the society, which acts in favour of housing
policy of Australia. Those attributes helps to achieve the desired outcome of the social policy.
On the other hand, there exists several factors, which acts against the housing policy of Australia.
Those hinders prevent from achieving the desired outcome of the social policy.
Housing policy in Australia
Housing is fundamental to all citizens of the Australia. Thus, the government is focused
on developing a proper housing policy, which especially helps the disadvantaged population of
the country (Treasury.gov.au, 2019). A number of key economic and social aspects of the society
is influenced by the housing market of the country. Hence, it is important to bring reform in the
housing market of the country. Housing plays a pivotal role from a social perspective. It enables

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the population to form families, participate in society and enjoy retirement. Housing policy
should be specially designed for the mentally challenged, unemployed, homeless and disabled
people. As they are unable to afford housing for themselves, government take initiatives in order
to provide affordable housing for them. Housing determines health and education outcomes of
the individuals. The employment has a significant impact on the housing market, as it determines
the affordability of the housing. Hence, it is in the central of welfare system of the Australia.
The role of the Australian government in housing market is worked at two levels. The
structural level is the first level. In this level, the policy framework to operate the overall market
is determined by the Australian government (Beer et al., 2016). At the second level of the
housing policy, government directly intervened into the market. The main reason behind the
government intervention is to reach appropriate outcome to the specific group of people of the
society, where the market is unable to provide appropriate outcome to all the people.
Government wanted to give special assistance to the disadvantaged people of the society. To
provide desired outcome of the housing policy to the disadvantaged group of people, government
intervened in the housing market. It gives protection to the disadvantaged group of people such
as mentally ill, homeless, unemployed and disables sections of the society (Arthurson, 2012).
The housing market in Australia is influenced by the local, state, territory and
commonwealth government at the structural level. To improve homelessness and housing
outcome of the country, government spend greater than 6 billion US dollars every year. The
responsibility of homelessness and housing are taken by the territory and state governments
(Gurran & Phibbs, 2015). The financial assistance provided by the Australian government to
housing sector includes Commonwealth Rent Assistance and the National Housing and
Homelessness Agreement (NHHA). Under the commonwealth rent assistance, government

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provide almost 4.6 billion US dollars per year for the eligible Australian population to pay their
rent. Moreover, under the National Housing and Homelessness Agreement (NHHA), government
give assistance of around 1.5 billion US dollars on yearly basis for the territories and states.
The main aim of the NHHA of Australia is to increase the accessibility of affordable and
secure housing for the Australians in the housing sector of the economy. To get funding under
the NHHA, the territories and states governments need to contribute to improved data reporting
and collection. In addition, the territories and state governments should also have publicly
available homelessness and housing strategies to avail funding from the Australian government
under the NHHA. The major target of the NHHA is jurisdiction specific priorities such as zoning
reforms, planning reforms, renewal of public housing stock and supply targets. It also facilitates
in delivering frontline homelessness services (Gurran & Ruming, 2016). Other than NHHA and
the Commonwealth Rent Assistance, government of Australia also undertook several other
homelessness and housing programs and agreements. These are Hobart City Deal, National
Rental Affordability Scheme and Building Better Regional Cities Program.
National Housing and homelessness Agreement
On 1st July 2018, National Housing and Homelessness Agreement (NHHA) commenced
in order to eradicate the homelessness of the Australian population and gives them the access of
the affordable and secure housing in the country. Government of Australia provided financial
assistance of 1.5 billion US dollars every year to improve housing affordability in the society. In
2019-20, under the NHHA, an amount of 125 million US dollars dedicated particularly for
homelessness services (Ong, Wood & Colic-Peisker, 2015). This funding will be utilized by the
territories and states governments. There are wide range of rules and regulations in order to get
the NHHA funding from the Australian government. The territories and states adopts the

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strategies to fulfil the objective under the housing policy. These strategies of territories and states
must comply with the housing priority policy of the government under the NHHA. These policy
areas are tenancy reforms, social housing, home ownership, zoning and planning reform
initiatives, affordable housing and supporting the viability and encouraging growth of the
community housing sector.
Government planned to address the homelessness among Australians with the help of
housing policy. The target group of the housing policy is disadvantaged and homeless people of
the society (Flatau et al., 2014). Government took the policy with the objective of reducing the
incidence of homelessness. As homelessness is the detrimental to the social development of the
country. Government planned to cover the sections of the society includes:
Older people
People experiencing repeat homelessness
Indigenous Australian population
People exiting from institutions or care into homelessness
Children and women affected by domestic and family violence
Young people and children
Other than these it also included disabled section of the society, people who are mentally
challenged and unemployed people (Crook & Kemp, 2014). These sections of the society
required security from the challenges involved in housing sector of the country. Unemployed
people are unable to secure a home for them due to lack of finance. These social policies of
government help them to secure an affordable home. People those are mentally unfit required a
social protection to sustain and to have a secured shelter. They are basically unable to find and
afford secured shelter for themselves. Government under different housing schemes tried to

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protect these mentally challenged people. Furthermore, people those who are disable, they need
social protection to live a healthy life. In general, they unable to get an employment opportunity.
Thus, lack of finance creates an obstacle for them to fulfil their basic needs. One such most
important basic need is housing. The main objective of government of Australia to extend
affordable housing facilities to these vulnerable peoples (Beer, Morris & Paris, 2015). It helps to
maintain an economic and financial balance within the society. There exists unequal distribution
of resources within the country, which resulted in economic as well as social crisis. The gap
between higher income group and lower income group widens due to unequal distribution of
wealth. Government tried to reinsure the distribution of resources and stabilize the social and
economic growth of the country. In this way, it also protects the vulnerable section if the society.
Government tried to overcome the housing problem of the country by expanded supply of
affordable housing, improved homelessness services and early intervention in the sector.
Though, majority of Australians are well housed. There exists severe housing crisis in the
country. The homelessness in the country increased dramatically in recent years. The
disadvantaged sections are deprived from the basic social benefits such as affordable housing. In
2008, government of Australia planned to halve the homelessness by 2020 (Zufferey & Chung,
2015). Homelessness is the basic problem of the society. Shelter is the basic need of the one,
which should be ensured to live a healthy life.
There are various drawbacks of the society, which resulted in failure of the housing
policy of Australia (Marston & Dee, 2015). The system of social security changed. It shifted the
receipts of the welfare benefit towards lower payments. Moreover, there were various conditions
of eligibility for getting welfare benefit. On Contrary, the sanctioning of the claimants are also
scaled up. There was an incremental long-term effect of inadequate welfare indexation. It led to

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lower affordability of the Australian for a decent housing. It mainly impacted the lower income
group of the society. Another social disputes, which increased significantly in recent year is
rising population in the prison (Meagher & Goodwin, 2015). The criminal policy of the country
expanded the number of prison population. Therefore, when the country is already indebted in
homelessness, discharge of the prison population would aggravate the problem of the society.
These social developments are considered as the obstacle to the social policy such as
housing policy in Australia. In Australia, the social housing provision at a subsidized rate and
international standards are minimal (Carson & Kerr, 2014). Thus, in such condition introduction
of these social developments created difficulties for the society. Hence, to avail a shelter, the vast
population of Australian lower income groups must rely on the private rental sector, which is
already stressed. Even the availability of low cost homes in this sector had also plummeted
(Stebbing & Spies-Butcher, 2016). According to the census statistics of Australia of 2016, the
homelessness in Australia scaled up by 14% since 2011 despite various social and economic
reform policies. The figure is greater than the population growth of the country.
Some cities witnessed significant rise in the homelessness include Darwin, Sydney and
Brisbane. The homelessness in Sydney increased by 48% since 2011. Likewise, the
homelessness in Brisbane surged to 32% since 2011. Moreover, it also scaled up in Darwin by
36% since 2011. The people those who sleep rough increased drastically in recent years. Over
the period of 2011 to 2016, the extreme and most visible form of homelessness expanded by
20% in the Australia (Fozdar & Hartley, 2014). Although, it somewhat offset by the rehousing
initiatives for long-term street homeless. In the Australia, over the last decade, in the area of
rental stress the number of low income tenants grew from 35% to 44%. The figure also rose in

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New South Wales from 43% to 51%. It also rose in Victoria from 32% to 47% over the decade
(McClelland & Smyth, 2014).
Therefore, it is observed from the homelessness trend of the Australia that some forces
acted in favour and some forces acted against the housing policy of Australia. The housing
market of Australia went through significant changes, which resulted in unequal distribution of
the resources. The problem of homelessness is greater in the larger cities of the Australia
compared to small cities. As the gap in income and other resources are greater in these larger
cities than the smaller ones. After introduction of the social protection policies, some
metropolitan areas of Australia recorded comparatively lower growth or reduction in
homelessness. On the other hand, in the metropolitan cities either growth in homelessness
increased or higher growth in homelessness (Balchin & Rhoden, 2019). In these states the hosing
and property market are relatively stronger and there prevailed various higher income group of
people. Therefore, it led to sufferings for the vulnerable and disadvantaged homeless people in
these areas. The non-metropolitan areas where this gap is less include Western Australia, South
Australia and Tasmania. As the government took a special scheme for the city of Hobart, the
growth in homelessness was moderate in this area, it was 21%.
Conclusion
Social policy plays a pivotal role in the development of the society. It protects from the
adverse circumstances of the society (Phillips & Goodwin, 2014). It helps to fulfil the basic
necessities of the people. The social policies are generally adopted by the government of the
country, which brings wellbeing through equal distribution of the resources. Though, every
people have right to avail basic needs for the survival. However, unequal distribution of the
resources lead to deprivation among the disadvantaged section of the people. To fulfil one of the

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basic need of people, housing, Australian government introduced housing policy. Government
launched different schemes and agreements under hosing policy of Australia. One of the vital
scheme was NHHA. It launched to help people with homelessness (Bricocoli & Cucca, 2016).
Under this scheme, government gave financial assistance to the territories and state government
to provide affordable and secure housing to lower income, mentally challenged, unemployed,
disabled and homeless people of the society. In addition, to bring reform in housing sector of the
country, government also adopted rental schemes. However, there were several hinders in the
way of social policy in the housing sector. The policy failed to give security to the lower income
groups. A wide range of regulatory norms created obstacle in getting affordable and secure
housing.

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