Mixed bag for Sydney's renters: report

Rents for Sydney homes have increased by more than 16 per cent in the past year.

The New South Wales Government says there is good and bad news for Sydney's renters in the state's latest housing figures.

The quarterly Housing NSW Rent and Sales Report shows rent rises in Sydney's inner city suburbs are slowing.

But the Housing Minister, David Borger, says the data also shows that rents in other areas of the city are increasing.

"The latest report is showing that certainly rents in the inner city have decreased by a small margin, but rents in outer western Sydney are continuing to rise quite rapidly," he said.

"The last 12 months have seen rents rise between 16.4 per cent for houses and 20 per cent for apartments."

Mr Borger says the Government wants to pave the way for increasing affordable housing in 2009.

"I'm working closely with the Planning Minister, Kristina Keneally, to review planning laws to make it easier for council and developers to build more affordable housing across New South Wales, and we hope to have that ready to go by early next year," he said.

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Greens push for affordable homes
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More families needing emergency support
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Report warns new wave of homelessness
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Upwardly immobile: mortgage stress bites
Reserve Bank statistics do not begin to tell the real story of housing stress in Sydney's western suburbs, according to financial counsellor Mike Young.

Households give up three years of gains
AUSTRALIAN households have been hit so hard this year that their financial gains of the past three years have been wiped out, a Reserve Bank report has found.

Rental rage surges in Sydney
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Qld has highest homeless rate in Australia
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More homeless seeking help: report
A new report shows there has been a substantial increase in the number of homeless Australians seeking government help.

Housing rents surge in Sydney
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First mortgages doubled in a decade: ABS
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Funding fall 'locks workers out of housing'
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Renters must pay for their own evictions
SYDNEY renters have plenty to gripe about. Not only are their rents soaring but they are also funding the legal machinery used by landlords to evict them.

NSW feels the deepest jobs cut
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Welfare services under strain: survey
The number of people accessing community services is on the rise, a new survey shows.

Report warns new wave of homelessness
State and federal governments are being warned of a new wave of homelessness threatening disadvantaged families.

When pain persists, they arrive
People are still angry when they lose their houses, but he notices that "people nowadays seem to think, when they take a loan, that it's a risk and that if they take the loan they might end up losing their house".

'No warning' about Beechwood collapse
The New South Wales Government says it had no warning one of the state's largest building companies was about to collapse, despite receiving more than 100 complaints over three years.

Housing crisis is real: industry
The Housing Industry Association (HIA) says new research highlights the seriousness of Australia's housing crisis.

Fee too much for Block project
THE Aboriginal Housing Company has accused the Minister for Planning, Frank Sartor, of "trying to crucify" an ambitious housing plan for the Block in Redfern after his department refused to waive a $60,000 development application processing fee for the project.

Greens push for affordable homes

The NSW Greens have introduced a bill into the Legislative Council that would allow councils to require up to 25 per cent of new multi-unit housing developments to be set aside for affordable housing.

The housing would be managed by councils, non-profit housing organisations or the Department of Housing. Rents would be limited to 30 per cent of the tenants' income.

The Greens say that the scheme is "by no means radical", with similar ones operating in Britain, the US, France and Japan. The developers' contribution could be monetary or in the form of housing units, they say.

The Greens' planning spokeswoman, Sylvia Hale said, "The bill is aimed at providing more affordable housing for low- and moderate-income earners. Councils can set their own target [from] 1 per cent to 25 per cent, based on housing needs.

"Recent statistics rate Sydney as the seventh least-affordable city in the world. Where will Sydney be when key workers such as teachers, nurses, police and aged and child-care workers can't afford to live here?" Ms Hale said.

There were already limited schemes operating in NSW. "One success story is the affordable housing run by City West Housing Company in inner Sydney. The Greens' bill removes the obstacles to the expansion of these types of schemes."

Ms Hale said councils are at present hamstrung by the requirement that a scheme be listed by the Minister for Planning in a State Environment Planning Policy. The previous and present planning ministers had not approved any new schemes, and when a council had asked it had been refused, she said.

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More families needing emergency support
The welfare group Anglicare says it is noticing a growing need among working families for emergency relief and housing support.

Report warns new wave of homelessness
State and federal governments are being warned of a new wave of homelessness threatening disadvantaged families.

Upwardly immobile: mortgage stress bites
Reserve Bank statistics do not begin to tell the real story of housing stress in Sydney's western suburbs, according to financial counsellor Mike Young.

Upwardly immobile: mortgage stress bites

Reserve Bank statistics do not begin to tell the real story of housing stress in Sydney's western suburbs, according to financial counsellor Mike Young.

The former banker who joined Parramatta Lifeline as a financial adviser about nine years ago has seen his client list expand exponentially in the last three years.

"I've been doing this for about nine years now and up until about three-and-a-half years ago I'd see one client a year with a mortgage problem," Mr Young said.

"I'm now seeing one client a week if not two a week and I only work two days a week. (Mortgage stress) is alive and well."

The biggest myth about mortgage arrears and home repossessions, according to Mr Young, is that the problem is confined to single-income, struggling families.

"It's not just the down and outers, a lot of the people I'm talking to are your upwardly mobiles where the thing to do is buy your investment property," he said.

Successive interest rate hikes and spiralling living costs have combined with falling house prices across much of Sydney's west, he said.

Abbotsbury father-of-two Gil is a victim of this cycle.

The 55-year-old steel industry manager bought a two-bedroom townhouse at Rooty Hill in 2003 as an investment, in the hope of having some "money on the side" during retirement.

He fixed the majority of the loan at 7.19 per cent but the rest is variable and currently sitting just above 9 per cent.

Gil, who did not want his surname published, says the real estate agent's "flashy and glittering sales pitch" about the potential capital growth and using equity in his first home, plus a loan to minimise his tax burden, were false promises.

His initial investment of $305,000 would now fetch just $265,000.

"When the property market was going up and up I thought I can't lose," Gil said.

"It was a bit late for me to do it, then I should have realised (the market) was too high. My only hope to keep this property is if the banks start lowering their rates in conjunction with the RBA."

He says the big banks' reluctance to pass on rate cuts was insulting.

"It's the banks thinking they won't have to put our interest rates down that really pissed me off," he said.

"Why don't they look within their smug little world and see what they can do to fix the problem because that's where it stemmed from and it was their decision-making that got us all in this predicament."

NSW Housing Minister David Borger, who is also the Member of Granville, criticised lenders for being too soft on financial checks and documentation.

But industry representatives said it was up to banks to decide which loans to approve.

"Unfortunately there are some fringe lenders in our industry and we are determined to rid our industry of these unscrupulous operators," Mortgage and Finance Association of Australia chief executive Phil Naylor said.

"The very small minority of brokers and lenders who recommend loans inappropriate for a borrower's needs are a blight on our whole industry."

Darren Murphy, from the Parramatta-based Loan Management Centre, said worried homeowners should ask for help as soon as possible.

"People will leave it until they're three months in arrears before they put their hand up," Mr Murphy said.

"If people sought advice and help from professionals sooner rather than later then they'd give themselves wider choices.

The client list at the Salvation Army's Moneycare counselling service has also long reflected this week's Reserve Bank of Australia Financial Stability Review.

Moneycare co-ordinator Tony Devlin said mortgage payment problems had grown from 10 per cent to half of the service's work.

Most families were victims of poor lending practices coupled with sheer bad luck, Mr Devlin said.

"It's not reckless spending, they've lost their job, there's been an illness, a partner has died," he said.

"Couple that with easy access to debt and it becomes a huge problem."

Related:

Households give up three years of gains
AUSTRALIAN households have been hit so hard this year that their financial gains of the past three years have been wiped out, a Reserve Bank report has found.

Rental rage surges in Sydney
One in three real estate agents have been threatened or abused by people frustrated at Sydney's rental shortage, a survey has found.

Qld has highest homeless rate in Australia
The latest Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) figures show Queensland has the highest homeless population in Australia.

More homeless seeking help: report
A new report shows there has been a substantial increase in the number of homeless Australians seeking government help.

Housing rents surge in Sydney
RENTS for houses across Sydney surged 8 per cent in the three months to June, driven by landlords facing higher mortgage rates.

First mortgages doubled in a decade: ABS
The amount first home buyers borrowed to make their housing purchase doubled in the 10 years to 2005-06, new statistics show.

Housing crisis forcing people to sleep rough
A Wesley Mission study found 71 per cent of respondents identified the housing crisis as the major reason for them becoming homeless. Of those, 88 per cent said accumulated debt and unexpected financial crisis were factors.

Funding fall 'locks workers out of housing'
People who cannot afford to rent or buy suitable homes have been locked out of public housing because of a drastic fall in national funding, a Sydney conference has heard.

Renters must pay for their own evictions
SYDNEY renters have plenty to gripe about. Not only are their rents soaring but they are also funding the legal machinery used by landlords to evict them.

NSW feels the deepest jobs cut
MORE than 17,000 NSW workers left or lost their jobs last month in the worst labour market reading in years, fuelling fears the state will suffer the brunt of the coming economic slowdown.

Welfare services under strain: survey
The number of people accessing community services is on the rise, a new survey shows.

Report warns new wave of homelessness
State and federal governments are being warned of a new wave of homelessness threatening disadvantaged families.

When pain persists, they arrive
People are still angry when they lose their houses, but he notices that "people nowadays seem to think, when they take a loan, that it's a risk and that if they take the loan they might end up losing their house".

'No warning' about Beechwood collapse
The New South Wales Government says it had no warning one of the state's largest building companies was about to collapse, despite receiving more than 100 complaints over three years.

Housing crisis is real: industry
The Housing Industry Association (HIA) says new research highlights the seriousness of Australia's housing crisis.

Fee too much for Block project
THE Aboriginal Housing Company has accused the Minister for Planning, Frank Sartor, of "trying to crucify" an ambitious housing plan for the Block in Redfern after his department refused to waive a $60,000 development application processing fee for the project.

Rental rage surges in Sydney

Sydney's housing vacancy rate remains unchanged at 1.2 per cent

One in three real estate agents have been threatened or abused by people frustrated at Sydney's rental shortage, a survey has found.

The survey by the Real Estate Institute of New South Wales has found 32 per cent of agents have been threatened or abused within the last month.

The institute's president, Steve Martin, says the police have been called into real estate offices in some instances.

"We've had threats to property managers that in the event of their application not being approved, physical violence would take place," he said.

"We've had the other extreme where people have threatened suicide if their application isn't approved, which is very, very concerning.

"It's pent up frustration from tenants where they have been continually applying for premises and unfortunately, their applications just haven't been approved.

"Now, that's not necessarily their fault. The properties simply aren't available."

Sydney's housing vacancy rate for August remained unchanged from July at 1.2 per cent.

Premier Nathan Rees will meet the Real Estate Institute for crisis talks today.

Welfare groups call for $7.5b housing plan

Welfare groups will today ask the Federal Government to build an extra 30,000 public housing dwellings over the next four years.

The organisations say their plan would cost $7.5 billion.

Gregor McPhee from the Australian Council for Social Service, says the boost is needed to cope with rising demand.

"We know that COAG is meeting early next month to talk about a new national affordable housing agreement and the Commonwealth and the States will be working together on that," he said.

"We see it as an historic opportunity to invest in public housing and as part of that an investment in public and community housing."

Australian bankruptcies up 3pc

New statistics show the number of Australians declaring bankruptcy rose by 3 per cent last financial year.

The Insolvency and Trustee Service Australia says there were almost 26,000 bankruptcies in the 2007/2008 financial year.

The agency's acting inspector-general, David Bergman, says he expects the figure will continue to rise.

"Generally in the country is that we've continued to like debt and obviously there are some pressures out there on people at the moment, we're certainly not expecting to see any decline," he said.

"We probably would expect over the next few years we'll see a similar rate of bankruptcies to what we've had in the last couple of years."

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Qld has highest homeless rate in Australia
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More homeless seeking help: report
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Housing rents surge in Sydney
RENTS for houses across Sydney surged 8 per cent in the three months to June, driven by landlords facing higher mortgage rates.

First mortgages doubled in a decade: ABS
The amount first home buyers borrowed to make their housing purchase doubled in the 10 years to 2005-06, new statistics show.

Housing crisis forcing people to sleep rough
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Funding fall 'locks workers out of housing'
People who cannot afford to rent or buy suitable homes have been locked out of public housing because of a drastic fall in national funding, a Sydney conference has heard.

Renters must pay for their own evictions
SYDNEY renters have plenty to gripe about. Not only are their rents soaring but they are also funding the legal machinery used by landlords to evict them.

NSW feels the deepest jobs cut
MORE than 17,000 NSW workers left or lost their jobs last month in the worst labour market reading in years, fuelling fears the state will suffer the brunt of the coming economic slowdown.

Welfare services under strain: survey
The number of people accessing community services is on the rise, a new survey shows.

Report warns new wave of homelessness
State and federal governments are being warned of a new wave of homelessness threatening disadvantaged families.

When pain persists, they arrive
People are still angry when they lose their houses, but he notices that "people nowadays seem to think, when they take a loan, that it's a risk and that if they take the loan they might end up losing their house".

'No warning' about Beechwood collapse
The New South Wales Government says it had no warning one of the state's largest building companies was about to collapse, despite receiving more than 100 complaints over three years.

Housing crisis is real: industry
The Housing Industry Association (HIA) says new research highlights the seriousness of Australia's housing crisis.

Fee too much for Block project
THE Aboriginal Housing Company has accused the Minister for Planning, Frank Sartor, of "trying to crucify" an ambitious housing plan for the Block in Redfern after his department refused to waive a $60,000 development application processing fee for the project.

Something is rotten in the state of NSW

IN 1998 the lid was lifted on the corrupt world of NSW railways, revealing that supplying prostitutes could win you a contract, fake medical certificates signed by a dead doctor would get you a day off work, and you could claim overtime while playing golf.

Ten years later it seems little has changed in RailCorp and the stench of corruption is slowly engulfing the NSW public sector.

In past 12 months the Independent Commission Against Corruption has held inquiries into three State Government agencies - the Roads and Traffic Authority, RailCorp and the Department of Housing; the NSW Fire Brigades has joined the list this week.

The commission has begun investigating claims that the former brigade project managers Christian Sanhueza and Clive Taylor awarded $6 million in contracts between 2005 and 2007, using fake tenders to give contracts to shelf companies controlled by Mr Sanhueza.

Contracts were then sub-contracted to cheaper building firms, allegedly netting the pair almost $2.5 million.

Ken Phillips, the director of the work reform unit at the Institute of Public Affairs, said the NSW public service was "rotten to the core".

"The governments in Victoria, South Australia and Queensland are pretty clean governments but NSW has never got over the rum rebellion," Mr Phillips said.

"NSW is very tribal and you have a mates culture in NSW that does not belong in any other state, which leads to an acceptance of sanctified corruption."

The fire brigade allegations are the latest to tarnish the public service and follow ICAC uncovering $22 million in fraudulent RailCorp contracts being awarded, including $3 million in kickbacks to rail staff, in one of the biggest investigations in the commission's history.

The inquiry, the seventh corruption investigation of the NSW railways since 1992, also revealed a welding manager defrauded RailCorp of $4.28 million and a contracts officer helped herself to $650,000. They were among eight people recommended for prosecution.

RailCorp was also under the corruption spotlight last year when it was discovered that an engineer, Said Marcos, awarded air-conditioning contracts to his mates, landing himself at least $710,000. But the problems are not confined to the railways.

In January this year, the commission investigated a state housing official, Douglas Norris, who took bribes to let people jump the public housing waiting list.

He also allowed homes to be used by drug dealers. It emerged that Mr Norris operated a bribes-for-accommodation scheme with alleged drug dealers and other housing tenants who acted as middlemen. Tenants paid between $500 and $700 for a bedsit or between $1500 and $1700 for a two- or three-bedroom flat.

And last year a Roads and Traffic Authority registry manager, Paul McPherson, was investigated by the commission after he provided at least 100 motorists the answers to their L-plate licence tests and gave advance warning of the route of their driving tests. False email records were also created to allow migrant New Zealanders to obtain NSW drivers' licences as part of the scam.

At least 12 public servants or contractors are facing criminal charges for their roles in various corrupt activities, and so widespread is the problem in RailCorp that the massive bureaucracy is struggling to implement the internal reforms required to fix its problems.

In a parliamentary inquiry into ICAC last month, the commissioner, Jerrold Cripps, said RailCorp had "flooded" the commission with work yet the Government was often extremely slow or had failed to implement the recommendations handed down by the commission.

"The perception is that we keep exposing it and nothing happens," Mr Cripps told the inquiry.

NSW rental crisis could get worse: institute

There is a warning that the record number of people defaulting on their mortgages will add to the New South Wales' rental crisis.

The latest July figures from The Real Estate Institute of New South Wales show rental vacancies improved by just 0.1 per cent in Sydney to 1.2 per cent.

The institute's chief executive, Tim McKibbin, says the rental market is under immense pressure and record high mortgage defaults will only inflame the situation.

"Mortgage defaulters [are] coming into the market and seeking accommodation in a market that's already depressed," he said.

"That is going to add additional stress to the market and very very unfortunately I guess additional stress to the mortgage defaulters, who have already had a considerable amount of upheaval in their lives already."

Mr McKibbin says the New South Wales Government is not doing enough to encourage new investment.

"What we've been telling the Government to do for months now is to look at stamp duty and land tax as being the two disincentives to investment in this area," he said.

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Housing rents surge in Sydney
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First mortgages doubled in a decade: ABS
The amount first home buyers borrowed to make their housing purchase doubled in the 10 years to 2005-06, new statistics show.

Housing crisis forcing people to sleep rough
A Wesley Mission study found 71 per cent of respondents identified the housing crisis as the major reason for them becoming homeless. Of those, 88 per cent said accumulated debt and unexpected financial crisis were factors.

Funding fall 'locks workers out of housing'
People who cannot afford to rent or buy suitable homes have been locked out of public housing because of a drastic fall in national funding, a Sydney conference has heard.

Renters must pay for their own evictions
SYDNEY renters have plenty to gripe about. Not only are their rents soaring but they are also funding the legal machinery used by landlords to evict them.

NSW feels the deepest jobs cut
MORE than 17,000 NSW workers left or lost their jobs last month in the worst labour market reading in years, fuelling fears the state will suffer the brunt of the coming economic slowdown.

Welfare services under strain: survey
The number of people accessing community services is on the rise, a new survey shows.

Report warns new wave of homelessness
State and federal governments are being warned of a new wave of homelessness threatening disadvantaged families.

When pain persists, they arrive
People are still angry when they lose their houses, but he notices that "people nowadays seem to think, when they take a loan, that it's a risk and that if they take the loan they might end up losing their house".

'No warning' about Beechwood collapse
The New South Wales Government says it had no warning one of the state's largest building companies was about to collapse, despite receiving more than 100 complaints over three years.

Housing crisis is real: industry
The Housing Industry Association (HIA) says new research highlights the seriousness of Australia's housing crisis.

Fee too much for Block project
THE Aboriginal Housing Company has accused the Minister for Planning, Frank Sartor, of "trying to crucify" an ambitious housing plan for the Block in Redfern after his department refused to waive a $60,000 development application processing fee for the project.

Remote teachers to strike over housing

Teachers in far north Queensland will hold 24-hour strikes in the next two weeks over the state of their housing.

Around 500 teachers from 28 schools in the Torres Strait, Cape York and Gulf of Carpentaria will stop work on July 31 and August 6.

Queensland Teachers Union president Steve Ryan said the action followed stop-work meetings in April.

"Teachers ... are living in insecure, leaking, rundown, sub-standard accommodation," Mr Ryan said.

"Yet the state budget announced in June utterly failed to deliver the funding levels required to provide safe, secure, adequate and sufficient housing in these areas."

Details of strike times and schools affected are available on the website www.qtu.asn.au

Constitutional recognition for Arnhem Land

An Indigenous leader has asked Mr Rudd to recognise the rights of the people of Arnhem Land and has also called for full control of the land and waters.

One group of elders presented him with a petition setting out complaints about the Northern Territory intervention and calling for it to be covered by the Racial Discrimination Act.

Another leader, the former Australian of the year, Galarrwuy Yunupingu, has presented Mr Rudd with a metre-long petition asking for constitutional recognition for the clans of Arnhem Land.

It also says they should have full economic independence to use the land and waters of the area.

It says the rights are self-evident and fundamental.

Mr Rudd has given no guarantees about the document but says he will seek consultation on it.

Little improvement in Indigenous housing: ABS

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) has released a social trends report that shows there was little improvement in housing conditions in remote Indigenous communities between 2001 and 2006.

The social trends report into housing and services in remote Aboriginal communities across Australia has compared 2001 and 2006 census data.

Over the five-year period there was an increase in the number of community-owned houses in remote communities needing repair or replacement.

The statistics also show that about a third of Indigenous households in remote communities are still overcrowded and need one or more extra bedrooms to accommodate the people living there.

In 2006 there were 3,400 people in remote communities who had no permanent address and were living in temporary accommodation such as sheds or humpies.

The report does identify measurable improvements in water and electricity supplies and sewerage disposal services.

More than 50 per cent of the Indigenous people included in the study lived in the Northern Territory.

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Aboriginal inmates '22pc and rising' of prison population
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Income management extended for NT
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Intervention delivering 'empty shipping containers, no houses'
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Abandon NT intervention: Commissioner
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Stolen generation compensation ruled out
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Budget to roll out new welfare card
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Racism to blame' for Aboriginal health problems
The Australians for Native Title and Reconciliation (ANTAR) group says racism is directly to blame for many health problems in the Aboriginal community.

Police cannot cope with backlash
Chief Minister, Paul Henderson, has warned the Federal Government that many indigenous people displaced by the emergency intervention are creating unrest and straining police capacity.

2020 Indigenous youth delegate calls for national body
An Indigenous youth representative at this weekend's 2020 summit says a new national Aboriginal body should be created to avoid some of the add-hoc policies surrounding the federal intervention.

Call for new indigenous body
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Roxon signs off on Indigenous health pledges
Indigenous Australians will have access to the same health services as the rest of the population by 2018, under a Federal Government plan.

Discrimination Act should apply to intervention: Calma
The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner wants the Racial Discrimination Act immediately reinstated in the Northern Territory's Indigenous communities.

Porn ban in Indigenous communities 'racist'
The Australian National Adult Retail Association (Eros) says the Federal Government's ban on X-rated pornography in Aboriginal communities is pointless, racist and should be revoked.

Retailers' warning on welfare card shop spies
EMPLOYEES across the country will be at risk of entrapment by government "spies", retailers have warned, under a Federal Government proposal to control fraudulent use of a new welfare debit card.

Union urges PM to act on Stolen Generations promise
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Union calls for $2.9b to fund education shortfall
The Education Union is calling on the Federal Government to provide an extra $2.9 billion in funding for public schools

Govt, union defend remote community schooling
The Centre for Independent Studies says Aboriginal students in the Northern Territory are finishing school with the numeracy and literacy skills of five-year-olds.

Aboriginal delegation heads to UN
The National Aboriginal Alliance is taking its concerns about the Northern Territory intervention to the United Nations

Indigenous welfare quarantine scheme gets go ahead
Parents in four Cape York Indigenous communities could soon have their welfare payments quarantined if they do not take care of their children and homes and do not stay out of trouble with the law.

Union urges PM to act on Stolen Generations promise
The Australian Education Union (AEU) wants the Federal Government to follow Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's apology to the Stolen Generations with a significant funding boost for Indigenous education in the Northern Territory.

First mortgages doubled in a decade: ABS

The amount first home buyers borrowed to make their housing purchase doubled in the 10 years to 2005-06, new statistics show.

The average loan per household rose to $213,000, according to the latest Australian Social Trends.

During the same period, the average value of first-buyer homes rose to $310,000.

But the proportion of first home buyers purchasing new houses fell to 14 per cent, from 23 per cent.

More popular were townhouses and apartments which made up 27 per cent of purchases, up from 15 per cent.

Over the past decade, a slightly higher proportion of Australian households rented their homes (28.5 per cent), up 1.5 per cent.

And perhaps not surprisingly, they moved around a lot more than owner occupiers.

More than a third of all renters had changed address in the past year, three times the rate of their occupiers.

But the profile of renters varied substantially with age, with the average age of renters being 37 years, 15 years younger than the median age for owner occupied households.

And the decision to rent rather than own mattered a lot if the household had a sole parent.

Sixty per cent of lone parent households with dependent children were renting, almost three times the rate of couples with dependent children. The ABS says this reflected relatively lower incomes for single parent families.

Nearly 30 per cent of households were renting their homes and the biggest renting age group was 35- to 44-year-olds.

The majority of renters were young adults and low-income families.

Australia's growing ... except for NSW

Australia is growing steadily, its cities are growing faster than country regions, but NSW continues to lose its population faster than any other state.

Australians also like to volunteer their services, with one in five adults undertaking a voluntary task each fortnight, and they're more likely to volunteer if they're healthy.

And they're more likely to have visited a naturopath, acupuncurist or chiropractor over the past few decades.

While the number of alternative health practitioners had almost doubled since 1996 top 8600, visits have increased by 50 per cent to around three quarters of a million in the same period. Almost a quarter of a million people had visited an alternative health practitioner in a sample two- week period.

Welcome to Australian Social Trends, the annual snapshot of national life produced by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

The survey is drawn from a mass of data - some of it already published but much unpublished - taken from the five-yearly ABS census and aimed at looking at contemporary social issues and areas which concern public policy makers.

Over the past decade, the nation swelled by 2.5 million people to 21 million by June 2007, with the greatest increase in population - 315,700 - happening in the past year. It's expected to reach 28 million by the middle of the century.

Public transport is becoming a more familiar way for adults to get to work, but it's still a minority of citizens who use buses, trains and trams. Nineteen per cent of city-based workers now use public transport daily, compared to 16 per cent a decade ago.

And internet access at home has ballooned over the past decade, with just under two thirds (64 per cent) of households with access, up from 16 per cent in 1998.

"Some government services, such as E-tax, child support and a range of Medicare functions, are now available online," according to the ABS.

"News services, internet shopping, and personal communications such as email, instant messaging and social networking sites are also increasingly a feature of people's daily lives."

While it's predominantly a younger age group which uses the internet at home, there have been significant increases in people aged over 55 using the internet.

In 2004, around 40 per cent of people aged between 55 and 64 used the internet, but within two years the takeup rate had lifted to 55 per cent.

Intervention delivering 'empty shipping containers, no houses'

NT Intervention....

A member of the Maningrida community in the Northern Territory's Arnhem Land says he cannot see any infrastructure changes as a result of the emergency intervention, and wants to know where the money has been spent.

Bawinanga Aboriginal Corporation chief executive Ian Munro says the intervention has failed to deliver on improvements in housing and health services.

He says the only visible change he can see is a few empty shipping containers where some of the intervention staff once lived, and no new houses.

Mr Munro says he believes it is the same situation in all 73 prescribed Aboriginal communities.

"It's disappointing for people who had hoped that the financial muscle of the Commonwealth Government would create significant improvements in the lives of these Aboriginal citizens," he said.

"Particularly in such prosperous times for our nation it simply doesn't seem right to see Aboriginal people living 25 to a house and living in a certain level of despair about their futures."

"Eight hundred additional Commonwealth public servants doesn't seem to me like a good investment when Maningrida, the largest community in the Northern Territory, can't have a dentist or a child protection worker or a youth worker."

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NAIDOC week to focus on Indigenous inequalities
A series of events to mark the contribution of Australia's Indigenous people will be held across the country this week.

Abandon NT intervention: Commissioner
The Northern Territory's Anti-Discrimination Commissioner Tony Fitzgerald says the Federal intervention into remote Aboriginal communities should be abandoned and the legislation underpinning it should be repealed.

Stolen generation compensation ruled out
A FEDERAL parliamentary committee has recommended a "healing" fund be set up to help members of the stolen generations, but knocked back the suggestion of compensation payments.

Budget to roll out new welfare card
Welfare plan: The new card will be initially rolled out in NT Indigenous communities. The Australian Council of Social Service (ACOSS) says the Rudd Government's proposed welfare debit card is not the best way to help struggling families.

Racism to blame' for Aboriginal health problems
The Australians for Native Title and Reconciliation (ANTAR) group says racism is directly to blame for many health problems in the Aboriginal community.

Police cannot cope with backlash
Chief Minister, Paul Henderson, has warned the Federal Government that many indigenous people displaced by the emergency intervention are creating unrest and straining police capacity.

2020 Indigenous youth delegate calls for national body
An Indigenous youth representative at this weekend's 2020 summit says a new national Aboriginal body should be created to avoid some of the add-hoc policies surrounding the federal intervention.

Call for new indigenous body
Former ATSIC Commissioner Klynton Wanganeen says he will raise the idea of a new national body to represent indigenous communities at the 2020 Summit.

Roxon signs off on Indigenous health pledges
Indigenous Australians will have access to the same health services as the rest of the population by 2018, under a Federal Government plan.

Discrimination Act should apply to intervention: Calma
The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner wants the Racial Discrimination Act immediately reinstated in the Northern Territory's Indigenous communities.

Porn ban in Indigenous communities 'racist'
The Australian National Adult Retail Association (Eros) says the Federal Government's ban on X-rated pornography in Aboriginal communities is pointless, racist and should be revoked.

Retailers' warning on welfare card shop spies
EMPLOYEES across the country will be at risk of entrapment by government "spies", retailers have warned, under a Federal Government proposal to control fraudulent use of a new welfare debit card.

Union urges PM to act on Stolen Generations promise
The Australian Education Union (AEU) wants the Federal Government to follow Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's apology to the Stolen Generations with a significant funding boost for Indigenous education in the Northern Territory.

Union calls for $2.9b to fund education shortfall
The Education Union is calling on the Federal Government to provide an extra $2.9 billion in funding for public schools

Govt, union defend remote community schooling
The Centre for Independent Studies says Aboriginal students in the Northern Territory are finishing school with the numeracy and literacy skills of five-year-olds.

Aboriginal delegation heads to UN
The National Aboriginal Alliance is taking its concerns about the Northern Territory intervention to the United Nations

Indigenous welfare quarantine scheme gets go ahead
Parents in four Cape York Indigenous communities could soon have their welfare payments quarantined if they do not take care of their children and homes and do not stay out of trouble with the law.

Discrimination Act should apply to intervention: Calma
The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner wants the Racial Discrimination Act immediately reinstated in the Northern Territory's Indigenous communities.

Union urges PM to act on Stolen Generations promise
The Australian Education Union (AEU) wants the Federal Government to follow Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's apology to the Stolen Generations with a significant funding boost for Indigenous education in the Northern Territory.

Aboriginal inmates '22pc and rising' of prison population
The Cooperative Research Centre for Aboriginal Health says new research is urgently needed to address the worsening rate of Indigenous incarceration.

Housing dept under scrutiny over neglect

Better monitoring of public housing may have uncovered the problem earlier.

Questions have been raised about the role of public housing authorities in a case of alleged child neglect in Canberra.

A woman has been charged with neglect for allegedly allowing her four children to live in squalor.

The 35-year-old appeared in the ACT Magistrates Court yesterday and was remanded in custody.

The court heard police found the children alone in a house, in the inner-north suburb of Ainslie, which was littered with dog faeces, moulded food and rubbish.

But better monitoring of public housing may have uncovered the problem earlier.

Housing ACT have many questions to answer in relation to this case.

If there were regular inspections on properties where we can cleary see there is a mess then that should have been attended to by housing authorities.

They have some 40 housing managers to service over 11,500 properties, clearly they're under pressure and more resources may be needed.

The Housing Minister needs to really respond in saying why this property was not picked up during regular inspections.

Meanwhile, doctors are calling for a new parenting program to be rolled out in Canberra to help reduce cases of neglect.

Australian General Practice Network CEO Kate Carnell says the parenting scheme has been trailed successfully in Brisbane at a cost of about $20 per family.

"This is a program that's now been evaluated," she said.

"What it shows is that if it was rolled out right across Australia you would end up with 72,000 fewer parents reporting problems with depression, nearly 100,000 fewer parents using coercive parenting practices, a whole range of really good data that runs off the back of this."

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Government must do more to support families
The Government needs to do much more to support familles so parents can afford to feed their children and to prevent children from neglect.

Funding fall 'locks workers out of housing'

People who cannot afford to rent or buy suitable homes have been locked out of public housing because of a drastic fall in national funding, a Sydney conference has heard.

The conference, organised by affordable housing lobby group Shelter New South Wales, is focusing much of its attention on the State Government's plan to reform public housing in the wake of the funding drop.

The amount spent on Commonwealth-State Housing Agreements fell from a peak of about $1.1 billion in 1994-95 to $955 million in 2006-07, according to Federal Government and Parliamentary Library figures.

Inflation and rapidly increasing land prices have made this fall in funding much larger in real terms.

Shelter NSW executive officer Mary Perkins says the drop has barred many low-income working households from public housing.

"Over the last 10 years plus, our public housing system has been, by process of attrition, constrained of funds considerably," she said.

"In response to that, our governments have basically rationed it and targeted who's eligible and who's not eligible. Now we have a situation where only the most needy of the most needy are eligible for public housing."

Ms Perkins says this leaves many low-income earners ineligible for public housing but unable to afford to buy or rent suitable homes.

"We've created a new middle ground of people - people who were too poor to get into home ownership and who are too rich now to get into public housing, people who 20 years ago would have expected to have assistance in the public sector," she said.

"Those people are now struggling like mad in the private rental market in quite desperate circumstances."

'Targeting resources'

Housing NSW director-general Mike Allen says the department has to target its limited resources into areas that seem to be most in need.

"We are principally here to help those people who are on low income," he said. "That's our first and foremost priority."

Mr Allen says the department is trying to encourage the development of more affordable rental housing by other groups, including private industry, community groups and local government.

"We do have a role to also try and be a catalyst or a facilitator for other people to establish affordable rental housing that takes the pressure off the public and community housing system," he said.

He says he hopes federal funding will soon increase to facilitate a broader role for Housing NSW and fund more public and community housing.

"We've begun very positive negotiations with the new Australian Government around replacing our current Commonwealth-State Housing Agreement with a new national affordable housing agreement," he said.

"Those discussions and negotiations are only in their very early stages, but I'm very hopeful that they will lead to increased resources for us in NSW."

Home repossessions can be avoided: CHOICE

The consumer group CHOICE says some home repossessions could be avoided if people were more aware of their rights.

CHOICE says people facing repossession can often apply for an extension on their home loan.

Spokesman Christopher Zinn says many people do not realise they are allowed to make the application.

"It depends on the loan and the lender but at least it does give people other options, other options which at present they may not be aware of," he said.

"If people are going to be missing a repayment on their home loan the first thing they should do is contact their lender and ask what kind of hardship variations are available.

"They should also seek help from a financial counsellor and if more people did this earlier on in the piece there's no doubt there may well be fewer repossessions."

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NSW feels the deepest jobs cut
MORE than 17,000 NSW workers left or lost their jobs last month in the worst labour market reading in years, fuelling fears the state will suffer the brunt of the coming economic slowdown.

Welfare services under strain: survey
The number of people accessing community services is on the rise, a new survey shows.

Report warns new wave of homelessness
State and federal governments are being warned of a new wave of homelessness threatening disadvantaged families.

When pain persists, they arrive
People are still angry when they lose their houses, but he notices that "people nowadays seem to think, when they take a loan, that it's a risk and that if they take the loan they might end up losing their house".

Welfare services under strain: survey

The number of people accessing community services is on the rise, a new survey shows.

The Australian Community Sector Survey showed a 6.3 per cent increase in the number of people accessing services between 2005-06 and 2006-07.

The number of people turned away from the services also increased, by 24 per cent over the same period.

More than 700 service providers were interviewed by the Australian Council of Social Service (ACOSS) for the survey.

Housing and homeless services were the most stretched, turning away one in every seven people.

ACOSS acting CEO Gregor Macfie said community services are clearly under strain.

"Increased demand coupled with resource constraints leads to waiting lists, additional unpaid work by staff and volunteers and people being turned away from services," he said in a statement.

More than 80 per cent of agencies reported the cost of service delivery was not matched by funding levels.

And more than 60 per cent of agencies reported difficulties in attracting and retaining qualified staff.

Real estate agents punished for 'under-quoting'

Thirteen Sydney real estate agents have been disciplined for under-quoting house prices after a New South Wales Government investigation.

But industry advocates have rejected the findings, saying that the houses were sold at prices consistent with market forces.

The Office of Fair Trading fined 11 agents and issued two warnings for under quoting house values to attract more people at an auction.

The real estate agents are in areas including Epping, Double Bay, St George and Blacktown.

Minister for Fair Trading Linda Burney says the public prompted her to act.

"One of the reasons that we undertook the investigation was a result of a number of complaints," she said.

But Real Estate Institute of New South Wales president Steve Martin says in each case buyers ended up driving up the price

"I think it's a gross over-reaction," he said. "This is a clear case of buyers competing against each other."

The Government investigated 152 auctions in total.

Renters must pay for their own evictions

SYDNEY renters have plenty to gripe about. Not only are their rents soaring but they are also funding the legal machinery used by landlords to evict them.

The Consumer, Trader and Tenancy Tribunal is among a number of government services sponsored by interest payments from rental bonds lodged by tenants.

But tenants rarely use the tribunal to complain about lax landlords or unfair rent rises. The tribunal mostly deals with landlords' appeals to have rental contracts torn up, and these appeals are up by about 5 per cent from the same period last year.

Of the 14,400 appeals in the three months to March, there were only 130 relating to excessive rent rises, compared with 7900 relating to "termination."

"We think rental bond money should be put to purposes that advantage tenants collectively," said the policy officer for the Tenants Union of NSW, Chris Martin. "The cost of the administration of justice should be borne by the community generally, not by tenants."

As Sydney rents and interest rates have soared, the NSW Government has enjoyed a growing windfall from bonds lodged with the Rental Bond Board when renters move. Barely any of the money is paid back to tenants when they leave the property and reclaim the bond.

The board pays the same interest rate to tenants as a Commonwealth Bank Streamline account: 0.01 per cent. But with interest rates on fixed-income investments about 9 per cent, the board's own surplus is ballooning.

Last financial year, the board earned $42.5 million after investing $680 million from rental bonds. The tribunal is just one of the tenancy-related services it spends the money on.

Last year the board paid $30 million to the State Government's affordable housing program as part of a two-year, $40-million investment.

Part of the money was spent on 70 new rental properties for low- and moderate-income earners on the old Australian Defence Industries site at St Marys.

Mr Martin said it was "a little disappointing that this Government, which has not done enough on affordable housing policy … has tapped tenants".

The majority of applications for termination made in the tribunal do not result in evictions.

The tribunal's deputy chairwoman for registry and administration, Elizabeth Tydd, said that even though it was mainly used by landlords, it was nevertheless an important protection for renters.

Mr Martin, whose organisation is also partly funded by the board, nevertheless called for interest earned on rental bonds to be returned to tenants.

The number of new bonds lodged has been falling as tenants ride out rising rents by staying put. Inner-city tenants have been particularly inclined to settle, with the number of bonds lodged in areas such as Woollahra, Waverley, Leichhardt and Ashfield dropping almost 15 per cent since 2003. The Government has said it was planning to stop paying the 0.01 per cent interest on bond money, which amounts to just $80,000 a year on the $650 million it holds.

Fee too much for Block project

The block - Stand-off … the site for which 62 houses are proposed.

THE Aboriginal Housing Company has accused the Minister for Planning, Frank Sartor, of "trying to crucify" an ambitious housing plan for the Block in Redfern after his department refused to waive a $60,000 development application processing fee for the project.

The Pemulwuy Project, a $50 million plan for 62 houses, a gym and an elders' centre, is on hold because the not-for-profit housing company says it cannot afford the processing fee.

"We are a charitable organisation and we don't receive any money from the Government," said the head of the Aboriginal Housing Company, Mick Mundine. "We don't understand why they need $60,000 just to look at our DA, but they wrote back saying they won't let us off the fee."

The company's project manager, Peter Valilis, said money could not be raised from investors until the the development application was passed.

"Frank Sartor is a guy who just does not want this new complex to go ahead," said Mr Valilis, who added that the company would refuse to pay the fee.

"It is really just a stand-off. They have said they will not do an assessment on the project until they get their money, so it could sit there indefinitely."

Mr Sartor has argued that the Pemulwuy Project is too big and that 62 houses is too many for the Block, which is private land owned by the Aboriginal Housing Company.

He attracted controversy in 2005 when he said Mr Mundine should "bring your black arse" down to his office to discuss plans for the Block. Mr Sartor apologised.

A spokesman for the Planning Department said the Aboriginal Housing Company was being treated like any other applicant.

"The fees to be charged by the Department of Planning for the assessment of development proposals are prescribed by the Environmental Planning and Assessment Regulation. As such, the department charges proponents these fees, including other state agencies such as the Department of Housing and the Department of Health."

Processing fees cover the department's work assessing proposals, public exhibition and notification, consulting other agencies and presenting an assessment report for the minister.

The spokesman said the Planning Department was awaiting more information from the Aboriginal Housing Company, such as the final investment value of the project.

"While the Aboriginal Housing Company has now provided the Department with most of the information requested, the proposal is not able to proceed to public exhibition until these last remaining critical pieces of information are provided."

'No warning' about Beechwood collapse

The New South Wales Government says it had no warning one of the state's largest building companies was about to collapse, despite receiving more than 100 complaints over three years.

Beechwood Homes went into voluntary administration earlier this week and receivers were sent in yesterday afternoon.

It is believed a slowdown in the housing market fuelled by rising interest rates was behind the collapse.

About 300 homeowners in Sydney, the Hunter Valley and the south coast are expected to be affected.

NSW Fair Trading Minister Linda Burney said yesterday she had not received any complaints about the company.

But today the Minister confirmed she told Parliament about the complaints on April 1.

"I was advised on Monday evening that the collapse had taken place," she said.

"Prior to that, there was no warning that there was a major problem. The complaints that we've received over three years were minor in nature and all of them were mediated."

Ms Burney says the complaints were mostly resolved by the Consumer, Trade and Tenant Tribunal (CTTT).

"The number of complaints over the last three years for the biggest home building company in New South Wales was 119," she said.

"Most of the complaints were minor and they were mediated through the CTTT."

The Government says anyone who had their home built by Beechwood will be covered by the Home Warranty Insurance Certificate.

Related:

One in five will lose homes: report
Up to one in five households under mortgage stress will lose their homes, according to new figures. The findings in the monthly Anatomy of Australian Mortgage Stress to be released on Thursday show that about 20 per cent of people who go "into the slippery slide" of borrowing never get out.

When pain persists, they arrive
ALLEN DIAZLI has seen homeowners come and go over the past 17 years in the mortgage belt of Sydney. He's one of the Sheriff's men in Bankstown, the officers responsible for carrying out repossession orders for banks and mortgage brokers. But Mr Diazli has never seen the belt tighten by so many notches in such a short time for so many people. Since January, he and his colleagues have been repossessing an average 15 homes a week, more than three times the number they were doing three years ago. "This is crazy," he says. "We don't need any statistics to know how bad mortgage stress is for people. We've got a whiteboard that we fill out and it's been chock-a-block for months."

Legendary Author Gore Vidal on the Bush Presidency, History and the “United States of Amnesia” With a career spanning more than six decades, Gore Vidal is one of America’s most respected writers and thinkers. He’s authored more than twenty novels and five plays. His latest book is Point to Point Navigation: A Memoir.

Housing crisis is real: industry

The Housing Industry Association (HIA) says new research highlights the seriousness of Australia's housing crisis.

A report from AMP and the National Centre for Social and Economic Modelling shows property prices have jumped 400 per cent since 1986, while income has only increased by 120 per cent.

The research found it is more expensive to live in Sydney than New York.

Chris Lamont, from the HIA, says the study proves the housing affordability crisis is real.

"A lot of people have asserted that housing affordability is a myth, that it is simply Generation X and Y racking up the credit card and building mcmansions," he said.

"The reality is Generation X and Y are buying the cheapest existing stock they can get their hands on. They are finding the debt pressure too much."