The past few months of La Nina have been incredibly difficult for the people of New South Wales. Most obviously, floods in the Northern Rivers and across Sydney have devastated communities. A less visible problem has been the scourge of mould.

Over the last week, our news feeds and TV screens have been flooded with the horror of the fatal boarding house fire on Albermarle Street, Newtown. 

In many cases, the boarding house developments currently before our councils are not actually boarding houses but rather shoebox apartments no bigger than jail cells, without rent controls or other oversight to ensure they are housing the people who need the most support.

Older women are the fastest growing group of homeless people in Australia. A recent study estimated that 240,000 women aged 55 or older are at risk of homelessness nationally, as are another 165,000 women aged 45-55.

A question to the Government on the $140 million rental hardship package.

Inner west tenants and landlords have been left in the lurch by the NSW Government’s rental package, with only 16% of landlords covered by land tax relief measures and tenants who have lost their livelihoods through Covid-19 lumped with potentially huge debt bombs through rent deferrals. 

A question to the Minister of Innovation and Better Regulation.

A question to the Minister for Water, Property and Housing.

The single most effective thing that we can do to give renters a fair go is to end no-grounds eviction, but after two long years of consultation the Government is failing to take this critical step, and that is not good enough.

The Strata Schemes Management Amendment (Building Defects Scheme) Bill 2018 makes a number of changes to the building defects scheme, which requires developers of buildings of four storeys or more to lodge a bond equal to 2 per cent of the contract price for building work for a period of up to two years.