It's one of our most basic human rights: a safe place to lay your head each night. But for many of our most disadvantaged, affordable housing is increasingly out of reach in both the public and the private markets, compounding the many challenges they face. As reported recently, many vulnerable people are paying out an unsustainably high proportion of their income to rent space in rooming houses, despite the accommodation often being well below acceptable standards.

Data from the Tenants Union found that out of more than 100 rooming houses, only two offered affordable rents – that is less than 30 per cent of tenants' income. Many people were spending more than half their income on rent, with some spending up to 83 per cent.

A lack of public housing and skyrocketing rents in the private sector have made rooming houses the only option for many disadvantaged people, and evidence from the Tenants Union and others shows that unscrupulous landlords are using their monopoly position to prey on the vulnerable, charging exorbitant rents and refusing to maintain their properties to minimum standards of safety and cleanliness.

The human stories are harrowing, single people and families living in places with holes in the walls, mould and vermin. People paying so much rent they have little left over for food.

Rooming houses all too often come to public attention for the wrong reasons, and this evidence of exploitation in the sector throws the spotlight on a crisis urgently in need of comprehensive action from the state government.

Where is the public housing that should be available to vulnerable people, saving them from the desperation of overpriced, substandard rooming houses? We learned in May that while more than 30,000 applicants languish on the waiting list for public housing, many developments are either running years late or have stalled. The state Auditor-General's report found that public developments which would deliver 554 units are running at least two years late.

While the government deserves credit for allocating $152 million for a "housing blitz" to help women and children fleeing family violence, there is still a huge need for more money and better oversight of public housing.

There is also the question of monitoring rooming houses and keeping unscrupulous operators out of the sector. Laws introduced this year were aimed at banning criminals from gaining licences to run rooming houses. The laws were also touted as a means of ensuring rooming houses were run at minimum standards of safety, hygiene and security.

But this latest evidence of widespread exploitation in the sector shows that the new regulations either don't go far enough or are not being enforced.

Rooming houses are clearly a symptom of the broader housing affordability crisis. Many of those hoping to buy a home are being priced out of the market and staying in rental accommodation longer, and developers are buying up properties in gentrifying areas that had provided affordable options.

But we cannot throw up our hands at this complex social problem and leave disadvantaged people to pay way too much for substandard accommodation.

Some of the key groups working in affordable housing have proposed solutions such as forcing developers to ensure a percentage of their housing is affordable or low cost, and a vacancy tax on empty properties.

The state government is due to release an affordable-housing strategy later this year. More affordable options will surely lead to fewer people forced in desperation to turn to unsafe, substandard rooming houses, but we would be naive to think the demand for rooming house accommodation will disappear.

We urge the government to demonstrate the resources and the political will necessary to tackle this insidious problem.

By The Age Editorial, 13 October 2016

Read it online