Homelessness is a growing stain upon our society. And its not just unemployed people or people with mental health issues living on the streets, but working families forced to sleep in their cars due to sky-high rents, inadequate social housing, and a WINZ bureaucracy focused on cutting costs rather than helping people.
So its good to see the opposition getting together to present some solutions to this problem:
Developing a national strategy to end homelessness could save the Government more than $200 million each year, a cross-party inquiry has concluded.
Labour, the Greens and the Maori Party have released a report with 20 recommendations to tackle homelessness, after holding a series of hearings across New Zealand and receiving hundreds of submissions.
The report recommends rolling out a "housing first" approach as the main response to severe homelessness, as well as increasing the supply of state housing.
It also says the Government should build more affordable houses, reduce the cost of home building, and tackle property speculators.
These are all sensible solutions, and its good to know that they'll also save us money in the long-term. So will the government act? Yeah, right. So far they haven't even bothered to respond to the report. Which I guess shows how interested they are in solving the problem, rather than e.g. profiting from their own Auckland investment properties.
