Community
24 September, 2024
Housing project stalls
INDEPENDENT candidates for Cairns and Mulgrave Shane Cuthbert and Yodie Batski are calling on the state government and LNP to leave politics aside and fund the McLeod St social housing development before the state election.
The project by Mission Australia would use the lots in 140-146 McLeod St to build a nine-story building with 73 social housing units – 45 one-bedroom and 28 two-bedroom – to help battle the housing crisis in Cairns.
The development was supported by the state government in 2023 as part of a $2.8 billion budget investment from the Homes for Queenslanders scheme and was approved by Cairns Regional Council in May, 2024.
However, the project has remained stagnant with no funding received by Mission Australia to start construction.
Mr Cuthbert (candidate for Cairns) and Ms Batski (candidate for Mulgrave) are pressing both Labor and LNP to “put politics aside”, fund the project now and not use it as an election tactic.
“We have 6000 individuals in Cairns that are at risk of homelessness. Those figures were supplied at the homeless sleepout I did earlier in the year. It’s time that we stop playing politics,” Mr Cuthbert said.
“The question here is – why has this project been put off? It’s been approved by the council. It was a promise made to Mission Australia by the state government last year as part of their $2.8 billion package to build homes around Queensland.
“Mission Australia haven’t got the money yet. We are coming up to an election, and Mission Australia and I think a lot of people in Cairns are worried that if we don’t get that commitment now, prior to election, what is going to happen afterwards?
“So we’re calling on the LNP to make a similar commitment if elected or we’re asking for the Labor government to stick to its original promise and provide the funding to Mission Australia, so they can get started.”
Ms Batski said the state government’s commitment to housing would mostly go to southeast Queensland and that it was time for an independent MP to advocate for FNQ.
“The 53,500 homes the government has committed to – it’s a commitment to 2046, so when you look at it, I think they have done their number crunching wrong,” she said. “The needs are greater than what’s coming in, and they need to look at their funding formula. Like all government agencies, they will fund per capita, whereas here in North Queensland, we need to look at the needs first and not the population. And our needs actually outweigh our population.
“There was a bilateral agreement signed. The government’s not being honest about that bilateral agreement, and the money that they can spend per financial year does not even exceed $350 million so a project like this would not even fit into its current budget. The community is crying out, but the government’s not really listening. So when you start looking at the fine print and what they’ve committed to without the full knowledge of the community, it doesn’t meet our needs.”
