With Melbourne being in Stage 4 Lockdown, I've been sorting through some of my archival stuff and came across this video -an ABC 7.30 Report in NSW from 2009.
THE ISSUES RAISED IN THE VIDEO ARE STILL RELEVANT. In order to get public tenants to sign their leases over to Community ( Social ) Housing, the tenants were threatened that they would be moved out of the area if they did not sign.
A blind man said he had his hand held by staff from a Community Housing company to sign the change of lease forms!! He didn't really know what he was signing. He just wanted the stress and the sleeplessness to stop. He was thoroughly demoralised.
After this expose, the NSW Housing Department backed down, saying they would respect the choice of public tenants to remain in their homes as tenants of the government.
It would be interesting to know what has happened to this little estate in the meantime...
Maybe our friends at 'Friends of Public Housing NSW' - FOPHNSW - might be able to tell us?
Although the ABC at the time, called it surely one of the biggest property transactions to date- they did not challenge or debate this housing policy direction.
Meanwhile the privatisation of Public Housing to Community Housing companies continues, under the confusing and obfuscating term 'Social Housing'.
With very little public knowledge...
The most unfortunate story indicated above in 2009, alas still continues in Victoria today. This tenant appears to be tricked to move from public housing by a social housing provider is not an isolated case. Unfortunately this behaviour has become worse in Victoria where similar ploys have been discovered where trusting public housing tenants were tricked into vacating and found out later they were unable to return to their estate despite promises made to them. The culprits continue to get away with it with no accountability.
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