Local councils across Australia are being left to manage rising homelessness without the funding or resources to properly respond, according to a recent national study by the University of New South Wales.
Lead researcher from the UNSW School of Social Sciences Dr Andrew Clarke said that while councils play an important role in supporting their community, they need the state government to step up.
“We need higher tiers of government to step up and invest in social housing in particular. We can see councils as being part of the solution but by no means the solution on their own,” Dr Clarke said.
While local councils have three key roles in responding to homelessness in their areas, including connecting people to services, coordinating local responses and also making council property available to service providers, they don’t have mandate over critical resources like social and affordable housing.
