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Rooming house residents not yet adequately protected

Posted by on August 13th, 2015 · Uncategorized

BlackmanBH

(Self-portrait in front of boarding house – Charles Blackman)

Recent reforms to rooming house (or boarding house) regulation have as yet proved only partially effective in ensuring better resident outcomes in this relatively high risk form of accommodation. The new oversight systems established in parallel in 2012 in NSW and Victoria both involved the creation of state-wide rooming house registers and alterations to joint working between state and local governments. To some extent these moves may be seen as paralleling the increasingly intensive official scrutiny of rooming house-type premises in countries such as the UK.

Particular flaws in the new NSW and Victoria regulatory systems as highlighted in our newly published research include the lack of adequate incentives for a pro-active approach by local councils, and the highly variable quality of joint working between the two levels of government – local and state. Partly as a result, the new state-wide registers continue to omit significant – and probably very substantial – numbers of rooming houses from regulatory scrutiny.

The study, a partnership between RMIT University, Swinburne University and UNSW, involved extensive interviews with government and non-government stakeholders, as well as rooming house proprietors in Sydney and Melbourne. Our recently issued AHURI Final Report integrates findings from the two sets of fieldwork, as more specifically detailed in separately published AHURI research papers on rooming (boarding) house regulation in NSW and Victoria.

Until recently, the dominant story about rooming houses was one of decline and this remains an accurate perception when it comes to the ‘traditional rooming house’ sector. However, as emphasized by the research, premises of this sort account for only one element among a varied range of rooming house submarkets which have emerged in recent years. Growth sectors include the so-called ‘new generation boarding houses’ brought into being under the 2009 NSW Affordable Housing SEPP, and the student rooming/boarding house premises which have burgeoned in conventional residential dwellings across Sydney and Melbourne.

In improving official oversight of these increasingly diverse sub-markets the two Investigative Panels convened in the course of this research agreed that:

  • There is scope for improved coordination between state and local government in both states, a view more pronounced in NSW than in Victoria.
  • State governments should play a greater role in the regulation of rooming houses, again a view more pronounced in NSW than in Victoria.
  • Regulation of rooming houses should be seen more as housing standards regulation and be related more to regulation of other types of housing.

The NSW 2012 regulatory reforms are also being evaluated from a consumer perspective by the University of Western Sydney.

 

Published reports

Pawson, H., Dalton, T. & Hulse, K. (2015) Rooming house futures: governing for growth, transparency and fairness—New South Wales Discussion Paper; Melbourne: AHURI

Dalton, T., Hulse, K. & Pawson, H. (2015) Rooming house futures: governing for growth, transparency and fairness—Victorian Discussion Paper; Melbourne: AHURI

Dalton, T., Pawson, H. & Hulse, K. (2015) Rooming House Futures: Governing for Growth, Fairness and Transparency; Final Report no 245; Melbourne: AHURI

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