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The impact of Rent Assistance on housing affordability for low-income renters
The Commonwealth Government’s $3.6 billion annual Rent Assistance program is not helping all those Australians who need it. Problems in the design of the Rent Assistance program, combined with inadequate levels of Allowance payments for unemployed people and students, are exacerbating the extreme rates of housing stress that are impacting hundreds of thousands of individuals and families.
2014
Themes:
An Alternative Age-Friendly Handbook (for the socially engaged urban practitioner
This Alternative Age-friendly Handbook provides a playful and critical exploration of what creative urban practitioners can bring to emerging debates around the creation of Age-friendly Cities. What follows is a series of suggested modes and methods of Age-friendly practice. Small-scale actions and interventions we can start taking now to create Age-friendly spaces.
2014
The hidden housing problem: older and still renting
Increasing numbers of people in their 50s and 60s are renting. In Australia, we’re not meant to be renters in retirement. Our age pension system is built on the assumption we’ll own our homes outright. That’s why our age pension is low relative to other countries’ – because housing costs in older age are assumed to be low, too.
2014
Scandal of Europe's 11m empty homes
More than 11m homes lie empty across Europe – enough to house all of the continent's homeless twice over.
Housing campaigners said the incredible number of homes lying empty while millions of poor people were crying out for shelter was a shocking waste. "It's incredible.
2014
Themes:
Housing for Older Persons: Options Paper
The government has made significant changes to the way social housing is delivered across New Zealand following recommendations in 2010 by the Housing Shareholders Advisory Group.
2014
Cooperative housing for an ageing Australia
The focus of this study is on not-for-profit cooperative housing and the role it may be able to play in addressing the challenge of an ageing population in Australia.
2014
Exploring the possibility of change: the potential for an older people’s development in Newcastle upon Tyne
Cohousing and other kinds of community led approaches have been mentioned frequently in discussion about housing over the last decade.
Research into European examples of housing and support explored various innovative options that went beyond the housing and support models most of us are familiar with or added something different.
2013
Towards an agenda for post-carbon cities. Lessons from Lilac, the UK’s first ecological, affordable cohousing community
This paper explores an agenda towards post-carbon cities, extending and deepening established debates around low-carbon, sustainable cities in the process. The paper draws upon a case-study of an embryonic post-carbon initiative due for completion in 2013 called Lilac.
2013
Addressing later life homelessness
The study aims to contribute material to inform policies to reduce older people’s homelessness. The set of projects presented in this report are explicitly intended to provide a foundation for policies around homelessness for older Australians.
2013
Themes:
Addressing later life homelessness
This report examines older people’s homelessness in Australia. It follows on from the earlier report Homelessness and Older Australians: Scoping the Issues, published in 2011. The research has been funded through the Australian Government’s Homelessness Research Partnership Agreement, administered by the Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs.
2013
Themes:


"There is nothing like staying at home for real comfort."