Australia - Homelessness

Overview

Homeless people experience a number of human right violations. The most basic human right is the access to safe and secure housing, yet homelessness is not come about only by lack of housing, it is also a lack of relationships with family, friends and a community.A person who is homeless may face violations of the right to an adequate standard of living, the right to education, the right to liberty and security of the person, the right to privacy, the right to social security, the right to freedom from discrimination, the right to vote, and many more. Being homeless for certain individuals can literally mean being roofless, living on the streets, in abandon buildings or parks. This is predominantly known as homelessness and it the most visible kind of homelessness, but being homeless can also mean moving being several types of temporary shelter such as the homes of friends and relatives, refuges and hostels; or living in boarding houses on a long-term basis, with shared amenities and without security of tenure. This categorised as secondary homelessness by the Australian Bureau of Statistics. People living close to minimum community standard of housing such as staying with staying with relatives on a long term basis or renting a caravan without security of tenure is classed by ABS as marginally housed. It is debated whether this is actually deemed homeless and whether their experience insufficient housing should be included in the group homelessness.

Statistics

According to 'Homelessness Australia' there are currently 105,237 meaning on any given night 1 in 200 Australians are homeless. 56% of those being male and 44% female with a massive 30% being from overseas and 25% being of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander. Homelessness Australia represents the families, women escaping domestic violence, young people and single men and women who access the diverse support and advocacy services. As well as providing community awareness, advocating for the homeless and work to assist homeless people associations. NGO’s such as The Salvation Army are doing there bit providing 2000 beds for the homeless and 100,000 meals for the hungry per week as well as providing refuge for 500 victims of abuse which Homelessness Australia say is 55% of women’s reason for being homeless and a recent study by SAAP showed that domestic/family violence was the biggest single contributor to homelessness

Non- Legal Mechanisms

Micah Projects – Provide permanent safe housing for the homeless first and foremost, and then help to fix their cause of homelessness such as domestic violence, mental illness or addiction.

Wesley Mission – Give homeless individuals, families, elderly and young people short or medium term accommodation and support services, they also help to provide for those at risk of becoming homeless.

Street Smart – Support many smaller homelessness organisations with funding to ensure they can keep working to keep people off the streets.

Open Family Australia - Open Family Australia provides outreach support and services to young people who are homeless or at-risk of homelessness. They work to provide assistance to vulnerable young people in their communities. This is incredibly significant as Homelessness Australia’s statistics show the 17% of homeless people are under the age of 12.

Legal Mechanisms

Supported Accommodation Assistance Program Act 1994 - A person is homeless if, and only if, he or she has inadequate access to safe and secure housing. A person is taken to have inadequate access to safe and secure housing if the only housing to which the person has access:

Damages, or is likely to damage, the person's health.
Threatens the person's safety.
Marginalises the person through failing to provide access to: adequate personal amenities; or the economic and social supports that a home normally affords.
Places the person in circumstances which threaten or adversely affect the adequacy, safety, security and affordability of that housing.

The NSW Homeless Action Plan - is a new approach to homelessness which includes working more closely with the non-government sector. Their response to homelessness is aimed at aiding those at risk of becoming homeless, and assisting people in critical parts of their lives that are proven to cause homelessness such as relationship or family breakdown, moving between education and employment and leaving institutional settings.

White Paper for Homelessness: The Road Home - On 21 December 2008, the Prime Minister Kevin Rudd MP and former Minister for Housing, Tanya Plibersek MP, released the Government's White Paper on Homelessness: The Road Home. The goals set for ‘The Road Home’ are to halve the homeless population by the year 2020, and offer accommodation to all those who sleep rough and need it. Human rights are protected by a number of international human rights treaties, in particular the ‘International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR)’, the ‘International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR)’, and the ‘Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC)’. As a party to all these treaties, Australia is under legal and moral obligations to promote, protect and realise the human rights of all people.

Being a party to the ‘International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights’ requires the Australian government to implement the right to adequate housing and commit to forming tangible legislation, policies and create budgetary steps towards an protecting the human rights of the homeless. When regarding children protected by ‘The Conventions on the Rights of the Child’ the government has an instantaneous obligation to take all necessary measures to implement this right.

In 2006 United Nations Human Rights Council received a report from the UN’s Special Rapporteur on adequate housing, Miloon Kathari exposed that Australia had ‘failed to implement its legal obligation to progressively realise adequate housing, particularly in its responsibilities as a rich and prosperous country.’

Law Reform

In March 2013 Legal Aid NSW submitted the Child Protection Legislation Reform Legislative Proposals to The Australian Law Reform Commission. Section 2 of these proposals addressed ‘Providing a Safe and Stable Home for Children and Young People in Care’ which proposed to achieve greater permanency for children and young people in Out of Home Care by:

A. incorporating permanency into the objects of the Care Act including the preferred hierarchy of permanency being:

Family preservation/restoration
Long-term guardianship to relative or kin
Adoption
Parental responsibility to the Minister

B. Requiring that the Court can only make an order for parental responsibility to the Minister if adoption or long-term guardianship is not possible

C. Requiring permanency plans not involving restoration to include the pursuit of guardianship/adoptions or reasons why they should not be pursued.

D. Are there other measures for achieving greater permanency in the? Care Act that should be considered?

Permanency planning

Legal Aid NSW takes the view that all decisions about permanency planning for children must be based on the following fundamental principles:

Where children cannot safely live with their birth parents, the state is empowered to intervene into the lives of children and families, and to permanently place children into new family settings. Such powers by their very nature involve the intrusion of the state into the most fundamental aspects of family life, and therefore must be exercised with caution and balance; and
As a signatory to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, Australia is bound to ensure that its domestic legislation is reflective of that instrument. The existing legislation has been drafted with those principles in mind.

The permanency planning is preventive to children homelessness and aims to intervene with families to resolve issues before homelessness can occur.

Bibliography

http://www.homelessnessaustralia.org.au/index.php/about-homelessness/fact-sheets http://www.micahprojects.org.au/services/homelessness-to-home-support-services/intro http://www.wesleymission.org.au/services/Homeless_services/?ct_from=n http://www.streetsmartaustralia.org/homelessness http://www.openfamily.com.au/what-we-do.html http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/saaa1994359/s4.html http://www.housing.nsw.gov.au/Help+with+Housing/Homelessness/NSW+Homelessness+Action+Plan+(HAP).htm http://www.fahcsia.gov.au/our-responsibilities/housing-support/programs-services/homelessness/the-road-home-the-australian-government-white-paper-on-homelessness-0 http://www.legalaid.nsw.gov.au/what-we-do/law-reform

Category:Homelessness