I felt a sense of despair this week as The Age reported on the direct contrasts reflected in the lives of people in our status-conscious society today.
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What is happening to our communities?
Why can’t people who are in need of public housing experience the pleasure of at least renting, if not owning, a pleasant home just as those who are so much better off?
We, who call ourselves a compassionate society whose philosophy encourages inclusiveness of all peoples, not just those who have made money, could be more generous and supportive of each other and of such a scheme. We are a wealthy country. We live in a very privileged part of the world.
The NIMBY (Not In My Backyard) was in action before the Sidney Myer Haven in Bendigo was built. It appears that every time the words ‘public housing’ are mentioned everyone leaps up and down with outrage at threats of lower house prices and a ‘different’ class populating the area.
A study by Trotter and Vine (2014) provides a short list of broad social housing objectives such as the creation of safer, stronger communities, improving health, promoting independence, the creation of community spaces and skills development. What great goals to aim for.
Ashburton residents living near a planned public housing scheme are the latest in a long line of NIMBY. Here on one hand in Ashburton is a group of wealthy, entrenched Eastern suburban residents objecting to 1.4 hectares of land on which public housing is to be built.
The parcel is just a corner of a much larger wealthy plot of land on which developers are about to build very expensive and highly sought after apartments, 188 of them in three towers, which will overlook stunning views of a creek, sports fields, and a golf course.
‘Shoehorned into a corner of this highly sought after and valuable land will be 62 public housing apartments...of course into the worst quarter of the site.’(The Age, 25/3/17) The residents in these homes won’t have ‘magnificent, expansive views’.
Public housing has waiting lists of up to 33,000 people. At least 62 vulnerable families will have a home on this site, while no doubt gazing in some bewilderment at the opulence of the three towers covering the remaining three-quarters of the land.
On the next page in The Age, were 200 magnificent apartments being advertised in the heart of Melbourne. Goodness knows the price they will bring! (If you have to ask the price you can’t afford them, as the saying goes).
I don’t have a problem with any of those apartments being offered for sale, but let’s for goodness sake remember there are families out there who are struggling to make ends meet and for whom a roof over their heads is the only thing they dare to dream.
We need to give them a hand up.
Studies show that single women with little or no superannuation are particularly vulnerable and unable to provide a safe environment for themselves.
The distance between rich and poor is becoming more extreme each year.
If we don’t take care of those who are the battlers in our society, we risk an eventual revolution by those who feel they have been disenfranchised.
We have only to look at ‘Trump Land’ to see what has happened in America.
Let’s work instead towards bringing fairness and equity closer together between the haves and have-nots.
Public housing is a great start.
ANNIE YOUNG