Just before Christmas and acting on information received I expressed to the Minster for Housing Matt Conlan some concerns about the perceived directions of the NT Housing Department.
The Minister very promptly arranged a meeting for me with the department who were very obliging and in the main able to address those concerns.
I left the meeting feeling somewhat mollified but still with some nagging doubts regarding the overall departmental view of NT Housing’s role in our community.
During our discussions I asked some questions about what appears, from the outside at least, to be an increasing usage of NGOs to fill roles that I was informed the department didn’t see as its “core responsibility”.
This left me wondering what is the department’s “core responsibility” and who determines that responsibility?
Is it the community through the Minister? Or should it be left to departmental heads who have set their sights on becoming a more efficient organization, operating somewhat akin to a real estate office, while divesting themselves of various social responsibilities – “non core” duties – they have been asked to undertake in the past.
Sure, their goals may appear more practical and even economically justifiable, but the question must be asked, is this what we as the community want from NT Housing? For many years NT Housing was the very foundation of Alice providing affordable, what I like to call “incentive housing” that allowed many people who would not necessarily have qualified for bank loans a start in life.
Once upon a time Housing Homes were mostly occupied by fully employed low income families. Housing was an incentive for them to stay and build their lives in our town. Many used the start to become the builders, the business owners of today, moving on to bigger and better things, all because of the wonderful start provided by the Housing Commission which, at that time, was overseen by a local board.
While NT Housing has always had a welfare role to play, providing housing for the needy, in the past it was by no means the dominant role that it has become today.
I believe it is time we changed direction and looked after the needy not by pandering to their needs, but by the long term sustainable method of firstly looking after and providing for the workers in our community who will in turn create a thriving economy. They will employ more people and by the wealth created be better able to look after those that cannot look after themselves.
Making employment a prerequisite to qualifying for housing will be an additional incentive for those who wish to move to our community to get a job. This will be helping themselves and our community. I believe it’s time to go back to the future and reinvent NT Housing in its original format and start providing base level affordable housing for fully employed low income families.
That way we stop providing housing for non residents of our town who do not have a job! In short, start using NT Housing to import workers, not welfare recipients, while still of course maintaining a level of welfare housing for community members in proven need.