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Speaker 1: Has been reported that the coalition of welfare and housing

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Speaker 1: advocacy organizations behind the Everybody's Home campaign, they've released a

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Speaker 1: new paper comparing data on rents against the full time

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Speaker 1: award wages of people in fifteen essential worker categories who

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Speaker 1: are living alone. It's called the Priced Out Report, and

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Speaker 1: it says that essential workers have lost an average of

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Speaker 1: six hours from their weekly income to rent increases, which

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Speaker 1: works out to a loss of thirty seven days pay

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Speaker 1: each year since before the pandemic. Now, joining me in

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Speaker 1: the studio to tell us a little bit more about

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Speaker 1: this report and what it means for workers essential workers

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Speaker 1: here in the Northern Territory is Peter McMillan, who's the

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Speaker 1: CEO of NT Shelter. Good morning, Peter, they're really good.

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Speaker 1: Thank you as always for joining us in the studio.

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Speaker 1: Now the Everybody's Home Report, Peter, what exactly has it

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Speaker 1: told us?

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Speaker 2: This SAM report is amazing really in what it's about

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Speaker 2: key workers in a Northern Territory, KDI. I haven't seen

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Speaker 2: a report quite like this where it looks at you

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Speaker 2: everyday essential workers in our in the territories, such as

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Speaker 2: construction workers, delivery drivers, people working in schools, a school, teachers,

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Speaker 2: hospitality workers. What it's showing is that right across the territory,

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Speaker 2: people are spending around forty five percent or more of

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Speaker 2: their income in rent. And that's astounding because for those

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Speaker 2: of us who work in the housing space, we say

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Speaker 2: to people that if you're spending thirty percent or more

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Speaker 2: of your after tax income on household rent, for example,

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Speaker 2: then you're doing it tough. You're really starting to get

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Speaker 2: in a situation where you're finding hard to pay other

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Speaker 2: bills to juggle your household budget and costs, and even

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Speaker 2: starting to have to make sacrifices around what you can

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Speaker 2: spend your money on discretionary spending. So if you're spending

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Speaker 2: in some cases I'm just looking down a list now

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Speaker 2: for age care workers, sixty one percent of your income

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Speaker 2: on rent. It's absolutely astounding, and it just shows just

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Speaker 2: how hard it is out there for renters. It's incredible.

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Speaker 1: Really, that is astonishing, more than sixty percent of your

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Speaker 1: income on rent. And then, you know, I get that

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Speaker 1: if you're in a couple then that burden can be shared,

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Speaker 1: but if you are single, that's an incredibly tough situation

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Speaker 1: to be in.

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Speaker 2: Look absolutely, I mean, if you were a young person

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Speaker 2: wanting to get out of home, you'd be thinking twice.

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Speaker 2: I mean, you'd be thinking, I just can't afford that.

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Speaker 2: I've got to stay at home with mum and dad

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Speaker 2: a bit longer. If you're an existing individual or a

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Speaker 2: family that's in a rental property and the rent goes up,

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Speaker 2: or you're not sure what it's going to go up

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Speaker 2: at the end of your ease, and it goes up

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Speaker 2: seventy bucks a week as a can at the moment

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Speaker 2: quite quite often, then you are in a wad of pain. Really.

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Speaker 2: I mean, these are key workers we're talking about here, Katie.

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Speaker 2: These are all lifeblood of our economy.

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Speaker 1: We need them with. These are people that we actually

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Speaker 1: need in the Northern Territory.

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Speaker 2: What's really frustrating. There are things that we can do

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Speaker 2: about this, and we need to and I'd just like

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Speaker 2: to maybe mention before I forget that if you're in

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Speaker 2: that situation where you're starting to get payday loans or

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Speaker 2: buy now, pay later schemes, maybe you're falling behind on

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Speaker 2: your power bills, maybe it's hard for you to meet

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Speaker 2: the rent payments. You're falling behind there, or you can't

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Speaker 2: meet your loan repayments, getting quick and get help while

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Speaker 2: you can before it's too late, because once that collectors

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Speaker 2: start getting involved, it's very hard to get out of

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Speaker 2: that situation. So get financial help now. There's nothing to

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Speaker 2: be ashamed about in that, and there are really good

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Speaker 2: organizations out in the community that do that and can

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Speaker 2: provide you with help.

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Speaker 1: I reckon that's really good advice. And I actually think

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Speaker 1: that there's probably more people in the Northern Territory who

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Speaker 1: are struggling right now than what a lot of us realize,

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Speaker 1: because not only is the rent and is paying for

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Speaker 1: your housing incredibly high, but it's also like the cost

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Speaker 1: of living is really high right now.

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Speaker 2: You know, when we talk about when I've been on

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Speaker 2: your program before and talk about people that are visibly

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Speaker 2: doing it tough, like rough sleepers, visitors to town, this

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Speaker 2: is a whole new level together. This includes people who

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Speaker 2: are working in occupations, sometimes professional occupations, who just can't

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Speaker 2: make ends meet. What our member organizations like Catholic Care

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Speaker 2: are saying is that they're getting around five hundred people

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Speaker 2: a month coming through. So some are in mortgage stress,

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Speaker 2: some are in rental stress. We know that a number

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Speaker 2: of people who have like a mortgage offset account. We

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Speaker 2: know the Reserve Bank Governor's saying that there's less money

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Speaker 2: now and offset accounts, which is a sign that people

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Speaker 2: don't have that means to continue to fund or offset

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Speaker 2: their mortgages as they were in the past. People right

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Speaker 2: across Australia are doing it tough. A lot of people

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Speaker 2: you can't see right There are people who might be

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Speaker 2: as we've talked about before, there could be people CouchSurfing

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Speaker 2: or homeless in caravan parks, in intents, whatever whatever they

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Speaker 2: can do to make ends meet. But there's also we're

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Speaker 2: talking here about people who have jobs. So we're talking

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Speaker 2: about what some people say is like the working poor,

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Speaker 2: people in middle incomes, and as I said, a whole

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Speaker 2: raft of key occupations. I mean, if we're really wanting

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Speaker 2: to build and grow the territory, we've got construction workers

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Speaker 2: playing around sixty percent of their after tax income in rent,

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Speaker 2: then we're going to struggle.

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Speaker 1: We certainly are. We're going to struggle to get people

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Speaker 1: to come here to fill those jobs. Peter, how do

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Speaker 1: we compare to other states?

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Speaker 2: They're very similar numbers, Katie. So this is a national

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Speaker 2: problem and maybe you can just talk a little bit

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Speaker 2: about what we can do or what we should do

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Speaker 2: about this, not just to mention the Australian government and

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Speaker 2: also the territory government. Maybe I'll start off with the

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Speaker 2: territory government because there has been a program in place,

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Speaker 2: it's still in place in a Northern Territory called Rent

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Speaker 2: Choice and that's now open for people in the regional

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Speaker 2: locations of Catherine, Tenant Creek and Alice Springs where people

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Speaker 2: who are coming towards the end of day lease looking

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Speaker 2: to take out a new lease through a license real

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Speaker 2: estate agent can get up to six thousand dollars for

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Speaker 2: six months for key workers. So when we're talking about

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Speaker 2: key workers again, we're talking about people who are who

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Speaker 2: are trades, health and emergency services, transport and logistics, agriculture, construction,

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Speaker 2: sales and marketing. And there's a whole lot of occupations there.

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Speaker 2: So if you're in Catherine and your lease is coming

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Speaker 2: towards the end and you're wanting to renew, the rents

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Speaker 2: may be gone up or you're looking you're one of

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Speaker 2: those people who actually can find somewhere in Catherine, for example,

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Speaker 2: to rent, then check out that website, the Rent Choice website,

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Speaker 2: because you might be eligible for a subsidy. Those things

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Speaker 2: cut us to the non territory government for that, for

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Speaker 2: actually having a scheme that helps key workers meet the

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Speaker 2: costs of rent and so we can keep those people

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Speaker 2: in our regional economies. That's brilliant. We need to do

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Speaker 2: more of that. We need to continue that scheme in

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Speaker 2: the main budget and onwards, because it's like Rome's burning

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Speaker 2: right now, there's no doubt about it. The joints on

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Speaker 2: flier and we can't have more people going into homelessness

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Speaker 2: or even the territory to find someone that's cheaper to runt.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, you're spot on. Now what about we know that

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Speaker 1: the federal budget's going to be handed down in May

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Speaker 1: as well. What do you think that we need to

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Speaker 1: see here in the Northern Territory when it comes to

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Speaker 1: housing from the federal government perspective.

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Speaker 2: Well, I'm absolutely staggered, to be honest, Katie that you know,

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Speaker 2: we've got some positive policy coming out of Canberra around

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Speaker 2: building more social affordable housing. That's great, although the legislation

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Speaker 2: didn't get through the Senate and that's up in the

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Speaker 2: air at the moment. So as far as the territory

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Speaker 2: is concerned as things standard, the moment. We don't have

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Speaker 2: any guarantee it'll be any house is provided anytime soon.

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Speaker 2: But housing, of course is important and the government in

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Speaker 2: camera's got a key role to play. Let's look at

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Speaker 2: other things they can do. Since two thousand and eight

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Speaker 2: they've had a National Rental Affordability Scheme. They've paid three

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Speaker 2: quarters of the cost of that and the states have

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Speaker 2: picked up the other quarter. And that again provides an

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Speaker 2: eleven thousand and seven one hundred dollars subsidy for affordable

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Speaker 2: housing for workers. And that scheme's coming to an end

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Speaker 2: over the next few years. What that means is in

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Speaker 2: Australia we need literally hundreds of thousands of new homes

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Speaker 2: for social and affordable housing, but we're going to be

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Speaker 2: losing from the existing pool. You know, around another twenty

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Speaker 2: seven thousand houses across Australia, and right here in the

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Speaker 2: Northern Territory we've got nine hundred and forty families and

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Speaker 2: individuals getting rent assistance under that scheme. Now I mentioned before,

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Speaker 2: the joint's on fire. The thing we need to see

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Speaker 2: the least at the moment for people in those households

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Speaker 2: that are risk of losing that subsidy. When it runs

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Speaker 2: out this year or over the next couple of years,

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Speaker 2: they're going to have difficult choices to make again, can

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Speaker 2: they afford to find a place that they can afford

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Speaker 2: to rent? You know, we've got to look at ways

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Speaker 2: of continuing to meet the costs of households renting at

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Speaker 2: the moment, other things like the rent assistance which has

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Speaker 2: fallen behind the cost of rents, and we've seen in

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Speaker 2: DA it's one hundred and sixty dollars a week more

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Speaker 2: expensive now per week than it was back in twenty sixteen.

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Speaker 2: When you look at the price of rent that's gone

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Speaker 2: up compared to the price at which rent assistance has

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Speaker 2: gone up, there's been such a lag And the federal

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Speaker 2: government also can with the states, can have a conversation

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Speaker 2: with renters and with real estate agents around having something

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Speaker 2: like a rental Commissioner, which New South Wales is looking at,

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Speaker 2: saying what can we do to make sure that rent

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Speaker 2: increases are reasonable. I think most listeners will say, Okay,

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Speaker 2: rents shouldn't be capped, they shouldn't be frozen. That's not

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Speaker 2: going to happen, but what can we do to make

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Speaker 2: it reasonable so that you don't get a seventy percent

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Speaker 2: increase like we've seen it in situlately for rents. I mean,

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Speaker 2: what are we trying to achieve here again in the territory.

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Speaker 2: We're going to shoot ourselves in the foot. We've got

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Speaker 2: to have those conversations and we've got to do something

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Speaker 2: for renders until the new housing supply comes online. And

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Speaker 2: that's why I think the Common Walth government has got

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Speaker 2: it so wrong when they're saying we're building all these houses.

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Speaker 2: Look at all this stuff we're piling into the territory

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Speaker 2: in remote housing. Wonderful, that's so important. What at rents

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Speaker 2: right now? Who are going to go into homelesses? So

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Speaker 2: are you seriously going to abandon those people?

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Speaker 1: Well, that's exactly right. And then when you look at

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Speaker 1: the fact that they are essential workers that we actually need,

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Speaker 1: like we need them here in the Northern Territory. We're

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Speaker 1: screaming out to make sure that we fill the workforce.

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Speaker 1: So there does need to be so much work, Peter,

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Speaker 1: we have run out of time. Can I just ask

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Speaker 1: you though, before I let you go, if there is

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Speaker 1: anybody listening this morning that's thinking to themselves, you know,

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Speaker 1: I'm in some real strife at the moment financially, when

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Speaker 1: it comes to my rent, when it comes to juggling everything.

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Speaker 1: I don't want to be in that situation. What steps

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Speaker 1: can I take? Where would you sort of recommend that

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Speaker 1: they go to to get some of that financial assistance

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Speaker 1: or some help.

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Speaker 2: As a first step, I'd refer them to shelter me website,

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Speaker 2: which is a directory that provides links for people who

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Speaker 2: have financial needs, or housing needs or other forms of support.

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Speaker 2: That contains a really extensive listing, Katie Ross, the territory

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Speaker 2: of organizations, typically non government organizations and geos and charities

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Speaker 2: that provide that help, organizations like Catholic Care. So I

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Speaker 2: just I just suggest people put in NT Shelter sorry,

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Speaker 2: a shelter me dot org dot au. That's s h

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Speaker 2: E L T E r m E dot org dot au.

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Speaker 2: Follow the links and go and go and take some

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Speaker 2: action today if you're in that situation before it's too late.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. Peter McMillan, I always appreciate your time, The CEO

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Speaker 1: of MT Shelter, thank you so very much for joining

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Speaker 1: us on the show this morning.

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Speaker 2: Thank you, Katie