Steven Miles’ called out over tent city in Brisbane

A man living in a makeshift tent community in the heart of Steven Miles’ electorate has revealed the true extent of Queensland’s homelessness and housing crisis as department staff scramble to find safe accommodation for some of the young families living in the wilderness sleeping.

Zane McGill was the first to move into a tent at Mckillop Park in Rothwell, north of Brisbane, about 12 months ago when he lost his accommodation due to a combination of health problems.

Ironically, the park is in Mr Miles’ electorate of Murrumba and about 8 km from his office in Kallangur.

It is also directly across the road from the headquarters of Chris Whiting, the MP for the neighboring electorate of Bancroft.

About twenty people now live in the makeshift tent community, some even with young children.

The increased media attention has led to Department of Housing staff stepping in and finding accommodation for a number of young families, along with Mr Miles promising to visit many of the families.

Mr McGill told NCA NewsWire he began living a tough life after a ruptured abscess left him in hospital.

His Centrelink payments didn’t come back until six weeks after he was made redundant – at which point the owner of the private rental property where Mr McGill lived said he did not want to renew the lease.

“My boss wouldn’t let me go back to work because it was the second major bowel operation I’d had within nine months of each other,” Mr McGill said.

‘The one thing most people don’t understand is that although we are homeless, we are not homeless.

‘We are people. We have been put in a difficult situation that I don’t think most honest people would be able to handle if they weren’t prepared for it.”

Mr McGill has lived at the park for the past 12 months and was eventually joined by other families in similar circumstances.

Most spoke of similar rental situations where they had the capital to make a deposit but were simply unable to secure a lease.

Recent media attention prompted Mr Miles to pledge to visit the tent community, revealing that members of the Housing Department’s Critical Response Team (CRT) had already visited a number of times ‘in the past month’ to provide emergency housing .

“I firmly believe that every person deserves a safe place to call home,” Miles told parliament this week.

“I am incredibly concerned to hear that people in my electorate of Murrumba are sleeping rough. A tent is not a place to live and certainly not a place for children to live.

“I’m determined to visit as soon as possible… I want to hear their stories and provide the support needed to get these vulnerable Queenslanders back on their feet.”

Mr Miles said Mr Whiting’s office across the road from the park was “incredibly” involved in providing support to residents.

But McGill claims he feels let down after struggling to invite MPs to meet residents in the park.

He now has one message for the Prime Minister: ‘Stay for a week.’

“Live the life we ​​had,” Mr. McGill said.

“Get cut off at the end of the day. I have no money, no friends, no food, no shelter, no way to get a place and have to stay here for a week and start the same way we did.’

He called for government help and praised the work of the local community.

“I’ve literally been blubbering to myself a few times when I’ve come home to find donations given to me by people I don’t even know and haven’t even met because they’ve been left on my doorstep,” Mr McGill said.

‘So I don’t even know who to thank for that.

“Yet you have politicians who make hundreds of thousands of dollars a year and don’t even have the time to visit.”

Mr McGill urged politicians to make time to do what needed to be done for their constituents, calling the housing crisis the “biggest concern” in Queensland.

“I mean, we have families living in cars and tents and stuff just because we’re being evicted. Rents are going through the roof,” he says.

“They need to pay attention to the little people because at the end of the day it’s the big people who bring in all the dollars, but the little people are the ones who keep society going.”

It is understood Mr Miles’ office had been in contact with one person about the tent community earlier this week.

Members of the Housing Department CRT were in the area two weeks ago and spoke with four people, who were not interested in emergency shelter at the time.

It is understood one person accepted accommodations during another CRT visit this week.

The Queensland Government has announced a plan to boost housing construction to help alleviate demand for more homes.

Several others are also believed to be considering housing options, including social and crisis accommodation put on the table by the housing department.

Earlier this year, the state government announced it wanted to build a further 53,500 social homes by 2046, which would contribute around $6 billion in housing investment.

“Backed by a down payment for this purpose of $1.25 billion in additional resources, this will contribute to the $6 billion investment in social and affordable housing that our government has committed to,” reads a statement from the government of Queensland.

“The state will also continue to work with the federal government to secure funding to achieve this ambitious goal, including through the Social Housing Accelerator and ensuring Queensland receives its fair share under the Housing Australia Future Fund.”

In January, the national vacancy rate returned to a record low of 0.8 percent.

The rate in Brisbane started falling from 1.3 per cent at the end of 2021 when international borders were reopened, reaching a record low of 0.6 per cent from May to October 2022.

The January decline was attributed to a decline in the number of vacant rental properties and an increase in the average number of views per property listing Domain.

A new report released by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare Homelessness figures in 2021 showed that 39 per cent of people experiencing homelessness lived in ‘severely’ overcrowded housing.