It sounds great! A new $1 Billion dollar fund to create more public housing.
Finally the government is taking affordable housing seriously.
Premier Mike Baird even signed an agreement with the peak welfare body NCOSS promising to work in collaboration with the community sector on the issue.
Finally someone is doing something to reduce the massive waiting lists for public and social housing in NSW (59,000 households are on the list, waiting for up to 15 years).
But there’s a catch.
The whole plan is reliant on the electricity network sell off. If Baird can’t get that through the Upper House, public housing is back at the bottom of the priority list.
Is this just another case of political blackmail – if you want public housing you must support privatisation.
This SMH article has many community groups praising Baird’s plan:
http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/nsw-state-election-2015/mike-baird-brokers-1-b...
But this article by Herald reporter Sean Nicholls says the plan “may be one of the election campaign's most elaborate pieces of spin”.
http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/strange-bedfellows-social-housing-leveraged-to...
The Greens have a strong policy on social and public housing:
http://www.janbarham.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Greens-Submission...
Meanwhile, where is the Labor Party? Do they even have a public housing policy?