‘We’ve got a housing fix, tax tax tax the rich’: Protesters hold rally condemning housing crisis 

By CHRISTINE LAI

Two hundred people gathered outside of Sydney Town Hall on Friday evening to protest the ongoing housing crisis which has seen skyrocketing rent, rental vacancies at an all-time low and many people facing homelessness.

USyd Education Officer Yasmine Johnson chaired the rally and read a statement on behalf of UNSW Education Officer Cherish Kuehlmann, an activist who was arrested for protesting against the Commonwealth Bank and the Reserve Bank of Australia last week.

Kuehlmann was supposed to host the housing crisis speak out but was unable to attend due to her bail conditions, which mean that she is unable to be within 2km of Town Hall.

Kuehlmann’s statement reads as follows:

The NSW Police came to my house and detained me at midnight last Friday on the charge of aggravated trespass because I organised a protest for housing justice that afternoon. I was taken into custody before being released at 4am in the morning. The charge is serious. A guilty verdict carries a maximum penalty of 12 months in prison or a $13 200 fine. This is an intimidation tactic by the police. The student protest earlier that day rallied outside the CommBank in MARTIN PLACE demanding immediate measures for the housing crisis including rent caps and for public corporations to pay for public housing. Low-income renters and struggling homeowners are feeling the worst effects of the housing crisis. Landlords are jacking up rents but refusing to open their investment properties to renters at all. More than 60 400 properties in the Greater Sydney area sit empty while 163 000 people are on social housing waitlists across the state. Meanwhile, the Big 4 banks have raked in record profits from interests of ballooning household debt.

“Public Housing is a human right”

Action 4 Public Housing activist and Wiradjuri person Carolyn described the conditions of public housing in “this unceded continent” as significantly worse than other countries, stating “anybody should be able to get access to public housing, whether it be for a short time or a long time”.

Carolyn is a resident of public housing in Glebe and spoke on the urgency of the living conditions for tenants in her area, where “50% of people in my estate have left already, or as I put it, have been evicted already”.

“They claim we get two choices, but really what it is, is eviction. They will state where we’re going to go. Every step of the way they’ve made it really difficult, and some people would rather rough sleep than put up with it,” Carolyn said.

Martin Barker, Coordinator of Eastern Suburbs Area Tenancy Service, reflected on a recent experience where he went to the tribunal with a tenant who is a single mother of five children and was being evicted from her home because she was unable to pay rent.

The single mother had been on the public housing waitlist for 20 years and “instead of being given a house, she found living from hotel to hotel, made homeless from a system that told her that a landlord’s bottom line is worth more than a decent home for her and her kids”.

Barker declared that stories like this had been repeated “dozens, hundreds, thousands of times across NSW”.

NSW tenants crushed by rent spikes 

“I’ve been speaking to tenants who have been crushed by rent increases of 30%, 40%, 50%. Whole buildings of tenants who have been evicted by their landlord so they can turn it into Airbnbs. This is a crisis for students, workers, public housing tenants, anyone who is forced to line a landlord’s pockets just so they can have a place to live”, Barker said.

“This is not a crisis for the wealthy landlords who are milking millions of dollars, it is not a crisis for the big corporations, exploiting university students, leasing them for rents of up to $300 above the median for luxury properties with features like windows that open.”

According to Domain, only 0.8% of rental properties were available to lease nationally in January, which is its “lowest point on record”. Data by PwC and the Committee for Sydney found that inflation has hit citizens the hardest on essentials such as housing, food and beverages, electricity and transport.

Greens Member for Newtown  Jenny Leong denounced the laws that “favour the interests of property developers, landlords and people that seek to profit off of other people’s misery and housing insecurity”.

“The idea that private wealth is more important than communities and people being able to have access to safe, secure, and affordable homes is unacceptable. The idea that landlords and people are big investors get tax concessions and special treatment over the right of people who are renting and struggling to make ends meet is unacceptable,” Leong asserted.

The current annual inflation rate in Australia is 7.8%, while wages have been growing by just 3.3%, significantly lower for workers which adds another pressure under the current cost-of-living and housing crisis.