Housing and childcare
The shortage of housing and childcare in regional and remote communities contributes to the community legal sector workforce crisis.
Regional and remote housing crisis
Regional and remote communities are facing a worsening housing crisis.
Rental vacancy rates are hitting record-lows while rent prices are rapidly increasing. Public housing is limited or non-existent in regional and remote areas.
Housing diversity is lacking, with a dominance of detached housing, which limits options for households on single- or lower incomes. Constructions costs are higher and access to finance more limited in regional and remote areas. Local building industries tend to be small, without capacity to construct large, multi-dwelling buildings.
Government approaches to housing are city-centric and generally fail to address the needs of regional and remote people and communities.
For people who live in regional and remote areas, this means that it can be hard – or even impossible – to find a home to live in, let alone one that is affordable.
Shortages of early childhood education and care in regional and remote communities.
Early childhood education and care options tend to be limited and expensive in regional and remote communities.
Some of the reasons for this are high operational costs, workforce shortages, and infrastructure gaps.
In fact, regional and remote early childhood education and care providers face many of the same challenges as do regional and remote community legal centres.
Housing, childcare, and the community legal centres workforce crisis
The shortage of housing and childcare in regional and remote areas combine with chronic underfunding to drive an acute workforce crisis for community legal centres and other local services. Staff shortages then leave people and communities without access to the help they need and workers at risk of burnout and vicarious trauma in the face of overwhelming demand.
Community legal centres’ lack of resourcing to pay sufficient wages combine with low rental availability and high rent costs to leave frontline workers struggling to find a place to live. Limited childcare options can be another insurmountable barrier for regional and remote community legal sector workers who have children.
[lack of access to government housing, as compared to some government workers]
Case studies
quotes and/or case studies from a few centres/workers
So, what are the solutions?
There is no easy fix to the housing crisis and lack of childcare in regional and remote communities.
Addressing the low wages of community legal centre workers would help a little by enabling workers to pay higher housing costs or for more expensive childcare. Governments could also deploy some creative housing solutions, like making housing for government employees also available to workers from the community legal sector. These improvements would help a lot, but would not solve the problem.
[longterm government investment in housing; public housing builds; housing strategies that fully account for the needs and experiences of regional and remote communities; tax setting reform; rental reforms; workforce strategy and improved pay and conditions for the early childhood education and care industry; government investment in ECEC etc.]
All levels of government have a responsibility to commit to ongoing, increased, and strategic investment in housing and early childhood education and care infrastructure in regional and remote communities.