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The
Forum’s Policy
Advisory Committee (PAC)
identified and explored key emerging issues and recommended
further action on these issues. For example, the PAC may have
suggested brokering further discussion with a particular
stakeholder group or running a national seminar. At times,
the PAC recommended that an information or discussion paper
be prepared and broadly circulated to community housing
stakeholders.
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| Papers have been prepared from
the PAC discussion topics below: |
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The CSHA, workforce
disincentives, rents and private finance – 2003 |
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Some key components of risk management
for providers, administrators and tenants - 2002 |
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Shared Equity Arrangements - 2002 |
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Rent Structures - 2002 |
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Title and Financial Independence - 2001 |
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The
CSHA, workforce disincentives, rents and private finance – 2003 |
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The Australian Government put
an offer to the states and territories for a new Commonwealth
State Housing Agreement
(CSHA) in October 2002, with a view to finalising the multilateral
agreements by July 2003. The Commonwealth offer committed
indexed funds from 2004-05 and included a continuation of
the 1% efficiency dividend. The GST compensation paid during
the 1999 CSHA will cease in accordance with the 1999 decision
of the Council of Australian Governments. |
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Payment of 5% of base funds
to the states and territories is contingent on them achieving
some specific outcomes required by the Commonwealth. These
are: |
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That the states and territories demonstrate
they are addressing workforce disincentives. |
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That the states and territories demonstrate
they are working with the private sector. |
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The PAC was particularly concerned with
these two specific outcomes being sought by the Commonwealth.
It covers six main areas: |
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locational workforce disincentives |
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community based workforce disincentives |
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poverty traps and income related rents |
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organisational viability and income related
rents |
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private finance options |
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the challenges of private finance |
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The issue of rents – particularly
the impacts of income-related rents – is pertinent
to discussions of both workforce disincentives and private
finance.
The discussion paper is available
for download. |
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The CSHA, workforce
disincentives, rents and private finance – a
discussion paper: March 2003
PDF Document (100K)
Download Here
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| Some
key components of risk management for providers,
administrators and tenants - 2002 |
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Future growth in community housing is
likely to be increasingly reliant on new kinds of delivery
models, new partnerships and the ability of the sector
to attract private finance.
Community housing is looking at developing some different
ways of doing business to contribute to solving the more
complex and varied problems in the housing system. It is
now being accepted that the sector can add value system-wide:
it is not a part of the fringe but could have a substantial
role to play. Like the rest of the social housing sector,
but perhaps not to the same degree, community housing is
constrained by a lack of funds but, by being outside government
it has a greater capacity to utilise private finance.
This kind of future entails more emphasis on risk management
and transparent, accountable operations. However, within
some parts of government there is a prevailing view that
community housing organisations do not have the capacity
to manage more complex organisations or manage risk. And,
within parts of the community housing sector there is some
suspicion about adopting what are seen to be commercial
models.
In September 2002, the PAC discussed the challenges of
organisational change and building capacity in community
housing. A discussion paper was prepared based on this
discussion and is available for download. |
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Some key components
of risk management for providers, administrators and
tenants: the challenge of organisational change and capacity
building in community housing: September 2002
PDF Document (100K) Download Here
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| Shared
Equity Arrangements - 2002 |
Community housing
is a small but now well-established player in a multi-provider
social housing system. There are strong arguments for the growth
of the sector to both maximise the potential of community managed
housing and to avoid a future of being purely a niche market.
However, if community housing is to remain viable in the future,
it will have to supplement Commonwealth State Housing Agreement
(CSHA) capital funds with other forms of investment.
To date there has been considerable discussion of debt finance,
a modest expansion of new forms of joint ventures, and some
inconclusive exploration of large scale equity investment – including
equity bonds, institutional equity investment and a rental
property trust. However, the smaller scale forms of investment
have not been widely considered in the context of community
housing. Yet there are some key opportunities for securing
other forms of investment and some key work currently being
undertaken by community housing providers that moves away from
a grants model of funding.
There are broadly two kinds of investment that are of interest: |
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Shared equity investment by tenants |
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Equity Investment by tenants’ families |
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As well as the future
funding uncertainty of community housing, there are two key factors
driving the need for equity models that involve tenants or their
families. |
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The aging population |
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Non-institutionalisation |
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An information
paper has been prepared that briefly outlines existing and
potential tenant and family equity investment arrangements.
It also raises some key issues for further consideration.
The paper is available for download.
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Shared Equity Arrangements – an
information paper: April 2002
PDF Document (211K) Download
Here
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| Rent
Structures – 2002 |
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There are a number
of drivers that suggest broader debate on changes to the structure
of community and social housing
rents is timely, for example, issues of financial viability
for providers and the problem of poverty traps for tenants.
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Based on a discussion
by the Policy Advisory Committee, a paper has been prepared
that considers the drivers for rent reform and alternative
rent structures to income-related rents.
The
paper is available for download. |
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Rent Structures – a
discussion paper: April 2002
PDF Document (212K) Download
Here |
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| Title and Financial
Independence - 2001 |
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Currently, many
community housing providers are extremely limited in their
ability to manage
their business.
This is because very
few providers have the ability to make use of their assets – to
dispose of them, to gear against them, to reconfigure them,
to make decisions that would allow their value to be maintained
or enhanced (other than through the passive means of maintaining
their physical standard). In many cases, providers also have
very little capacity to manage other assets – most
importantly, the generation of operating surpluses that can
be used to manage
risks or to provide capital for reinvestment.
The reasons
for these two limitations are:
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In many jurisdictions, government holds title
to properties, and in those where providers hold title, government
holds a mortgage, charge or other caveat over the title. |
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In many jurisdictions, government has adopted
the principle that public subsidies (including capital subsidies)
should be completely expended or returned to government to be
redistributed. In particular, recurrent subsidies, required returns
on leasehold stock or on charges against the title, may be adjusted
to eliminate any operating surplus. This may be determined by
establishing operating benchmarks. |
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However, providers and, more recently, administrators
have argued that there is a strong need for community housing
to gain access to external finances, to respond more effectively
to local circumstances and to innovate new aspects of the business. |
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A paper has been
prepared that briefly sketches the risks and benefits of increasing
control by providers over property
and other assets. These risks and benefits were identified in
a discussion by the Policy Advisory Committee.
The discussion paper is available for download. |
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Title and Financial
Independence - A discussion paper: December 2001
PDF Document (197K) Download
Here
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