Public housing capacity should be expanded across Canberra to give more people in need the opportunity to access safe, long-term accommodation, an inquiry into cost-of-living pressures in the ACT has found.
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The parliamentary inquiry made 52 recommendations, which included telling the ACT government to substantially increase the capacity of Housing ACT to deliver a public housing renewal program.
The government should also buy more homes in the private market to grow the supply of public housing as quickly as possible, and manage its portfolio so the number of properties it owns is not in decline.
The Auditor-General should also consider a performance audit of the way the government has handled its growing and renewing public housing program.
"The Committee's view is that increasing community awareness of the benefits of new public housing, both to individuals and to the ACT as a whole, will benefit current and future public housing tenants as well as the wider community," the report, tabled in the Legislative Assembly on Thursday, said.
Construction delays of a year or longer for new public housing properties were unacceptable with 3000 people on the waiting list, the committee said.
"The ACT government should review the contract management protocols of Housing ACT in order to speed up both the demolition of old vacant properties and the construction of new properties," the committee's report said.
"This should be supplemented by substantially increasing the capacity of Housing ACT to support the delivery of the Growing and Renewing Public Housing Program, by recruiting and retaining specialist workforce with skills in contract management and procurement.
"The ACT government should also seek to limit the time tenants are displaced between the demolition of an old property and the construction of a new property."
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Other recommendations from the wide-ranging inquiry included expanding access to free dental services, a boost to bulk-billing general practitioners, a $250,000-a-year funding boost for Legal Aid and tougher rules to crack down on problem gambling.
The government should also consider ways to prevent young people from facing discrimination in the private rental market, the inquiry found.
The inquiry was conducted by a tripartisan select committee which was established in February.
Ms Lawder recommended general practice clinics be exempt from a recent extension of payroll tax and that ACT Labor stop "profiting from poker machine revenue through donations from the 1973 Foundation, which is an outrageous conflict of interest and hypocritical in the extreme".
The government should also stop "endless and exponential" increases to general rates and land tax, which Ms Lawder said contributed to housing unaffordability and cost-of-living pressures.
The government should also stop "over regulation of the rental market" and release more blocks of land for housing, she said.
The committee's chair, Greens backbencher Johnathan Davis, included an extra three recommendations that he noted were not supported by the rest of the committee.
The government should further regulate the price of rent in the private market, consider ways to restrict rent rises when a property is leased to new tenants, and amend renting laws to prevent landlords or agents accepting above-advertised rent, Mr Davis recommended.
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Jasper Lindell
Jasper Lindell joined The Canberra Times in 2018. He is a Legislative Assembly reporter, covering ACT politics and government. He also writes about development, transport, heritage, local history, literature and the arts, as well as contributing to the Times' Panorama magazine. He was previously a Sunday Canberra Times reporter.
Jasper Lindell joined The Canberra Times in 2018. He is a Legislative Assembly reporter, covering ACT politics and government. He also writes about development, transport, heritage, local history, literature and the arts, as well as contributing to the Times' Panorama magazine. He was previously a Sunday Canberra Times reporter.
