City Futures Blog

News and research in housing and urban policy, from Australia’s leading urban policy research centre.

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Entries Tagged as 'Government'

Coronavirus lays bare 5 big housing system flaws to be fixed

May 12th, 2020 · No Comments · Affordability, Construction, Economy, Government, Guest appearance, Housing, Housing supply, Pandemic, Tenancy, urban renewal

By Hal Pawson, City Futures Research Centre UNSW, and Peter Mares, Monash University. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. Australians had become used to walking past rough sleepers. Policymakers too, seemed unmoved by the people huddled in doorways or sheltering in parks under plastic sheets. […]

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Why City Futures backs social housing stimulus plan

May 5th, 2020 · No Comments · Economy, Government, Housing supply, Pandemic

By Bill Randolph, Director, City Futures Research Centre With Australia’s economy taking a record-breaking pandemic hit, governments now face the huge challenge of reviving employment as the health crisis subsides. It’s widely agreed that a stimulus spending program should be a central plank of the recovery plan.   Construction is an obvious stimulus target, since, […]

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Rents can and should be reduced or suspended for the coronavirus pandemic

April 8th, 2020 · No Comments · Affordability, Economy, Government, Housing, Law, Tenancy, Uncategorized

By Chris Martin, City Futures Research Centre. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. The National Cabinet announced a moratorium on evictions just over a week ago in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. As government ministers and commentators have tried to make clear, it’s intended only […]

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Why housing evictions must be suspended to defend us against coronavirus

March 23rd, 2020 · No Comments · Economy, Government, Guest appearance, Housing, Law, Money, Pandemic, Wellbeing

Antonio Guillem/Shutterstock By Sophia Maalsen, University of Sydney; Chris Martin, UNSW; Dallas Rogers, University of Sydney, and Emma Power, Western Sydney University. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. The COVID-19 pandemic is a double crisis affecting public health and the economy. And both aspects are playing […]

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Australia’s housing system needs a big shake-up: here’s how we can crack this

February 17th, 2020 · No Comments · Affordability, Economy, Finance, Government, Guest appearance, Housing, Housing supply, Tenancy

By Hal Pawson, UNSW; Judith Yates, University of Sydney, and Vivienne Milligan, UNSW. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. Despite two years of housing market cooling in Sydney and Melbourne, Australia stayed near the top of the global unaffordability league in 2019. And with prices rebounding […]

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Why adequate and affordable housing matters to productivity

January 21st, 2020 · No Comments · Cities, Economy, Government, Guest appearance, Housing, Productivity

By Wendy Hayhurst, CEO Community Housing Industry Association. Originally published on John Menadue’s Pearls and Irritations. A growing body of research is demonstrating the adverse productivity impacts of inadequate or unaffordable housing in Australia (and elsewhere). These include impacts on human capital through the mismatch between the availability of suitable housing and employment, and the distorting […]

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Australian cities pay the price for blocking council input to projects that shape them

December 17th, 2019 · No Comments · Government, Guest appearance, Productivity, Sydney

By Mike Harris, Lecturer in Landscape Architecture and Urban Design, Faculty of Built Environment, UNSW. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. National, state and city governments aspire to increase prosperity through globally competitive and more liveable cities. Through “world class” infrastructure, buildings and public spaces they aim […]

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As simple as finding a job? Getting people out of social housing is much more complex than that

December 12th, 2019 · No Comments · Affordability, Government, Guest appearance, Housing, Tenancy

By Chris Hartley, Center for Social Impact, UNSW and Kathleen Flanagan, University of Tasmania. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. A private member’s bill, moved by Labor MP Josh Burns, recently called on the Australian government “to help build more affordable homes” in response to the growing homelessness crisis. […]

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Lack of information on apartment defects leaves whole market on shaky footings

November 21st, 2019 · No Comments · Construction, Data, Government, Guest appearance, Housing, Housing conditions

By Martin Loosemore (University of Technology Sydney); Bill Randolph, Caitlin Buckle, Hazel Easthope, and Laura Crommelin (City Futures Research Centre, UNSW Sydney). This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.   The litany of defects, poor building standards and regulatory failures has serious implications for apartment owners, occupiers and buyers alike. Fears […]

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Greening for a resilient 21st century

November 19th, 2019 · No Comments · Cities, Government, Sustainability, Wellbeing

By Susan Thompson, City Futures Research Centre. Originally published in New Planner, the journal of the New South Wales planning profession, published by the Planning Institute of Australia. The great green city of the future is ecologically and economically resilient; it’s made up of healthy, livable neighborhoods where the benefits of nature are available to […]

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