interview by Simon Sellars

‘Housing Is A Human Right: An Interview with Miloon Kothari, UN Special Rapporteur’ was originally published in Subterrain magazine #2, July 2007.

In August 2006, the PILCH Homeless Person’s Legal Clinic held a consumer forum for people who are homeless or who have experienced homelessness. The idea was to invite this particular demographic to share their thoughts and experiences with regards to housing with Miloon Kothari, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Adequate Housing. Mr Kothari was visiting Melbourne as part of his Australian tour, the purpose of which is to examine the situation on the ground in relation to safe and adequate housing, and to compile a subsequent report to the UN Human Rights Commission on whether Australia’s commonwealth, state and territory governments are meeting their national and international obligations.

Subterrain attended the forum and afterwards interviewed Mr Kothari about the day’s events.

A rapporteur investigates a particular area and reports to a higher committee. Can you elaborate a bit more on your role?

Well, I’m a rapporteur on housing with the UN Consulate of Human Rights. It’s an honorary position but it’s a global mandate, in an independent capacity, where I have to look at the obstacles people are facing all around the world on issues such as access to housing, land, civic services and the effects of eviction. I report annually to the consulate on specific themes and I do two or three missions a year. This Australian trip is one of those missions, and after that we’ll prepare a mission report. The work involves communication with governments and we also do a lot of collaborative work with agencies across a range of different issues.

What were your impressions of the forum?

I think it was an excellent opportunity for me to hear directly from the people who are affected by homelessness in Australia, and to learn about the complex nature of the problem: how it affects people in many different ways, and also how the state isn’t able to respond to crisis, because all the systems that are in place are not enough and there are lots of people falling out of the system. I think that the overwhelming sense of the testimonies was that people really feel that if they get a service, or access to a service or shelter, then the state is doing them a favour. There’s something terribly wrong with that. There should be a relationship between the government and people who are deprived of housing, because housing is a human right – it’s a right and an entitlement first.

Is it the obligation of the state to create the right conditions and to provide the right opportunities?

Absolutely. I think that the Australian government is not doing enough. I’ve seen that all over the country: thousands of people are being left out of the system, and when you look at the problems like we heard today – involving single women with children, the elderly, youth, people who are disabled or have mental illness, people who are leaving prisons and detention centres – then you see there’s a range of particularly vulnerable groups that are not being catered to. There’s a problem in the whole approach to housing because you create a situation where there is a finite number of housing units available, both with social public housing and with the private market, and that number is getting less and less but the need is growing. I don’t think the home ownership and the probability ideology that seems to be governing a lot of housing issues in Australia is conducive to helping those that are poor. In fact it’s creating a squeeze in the market, whereby you’re going to have more and more people relying on less-available social housing. And when you have land prices, home prices and rental prices going up, even places where you do have public housing, or boarding homes or shelters, will be reduced because there is a demand on the market – especially in parts of cities where people have access to services and employment.

Last year the Howard government said that the responsibility for funding solutions to homelessness should be shared with corporations. Do you think that’s a shirking of responsibility?

Yeah, absolutely. I don’t think that has worked anywhere in the world. The primary responsibility has to remain with the state. Businesses are primarily interested in profit – it’s not in the interest of business to do this, and so there is a great deal of discrimination because they’re actually against people who are homeless or against indigenous people in their neighbourhoods. They think that actually having public housing in your neighbourhood or having low-income earners lowers, or depresses, the value of the land. The discrimination is at many, many different levels.

Actually, I’m quite distressed to hear that the Victorian Human Rights Charter does not condone economic, social and cultural rights. That’s something that has to be remedied because it’s inconsistent with Australia’s international human-rights obligations, which recognises economic, social and cultural rights including housing and food. If that is remedied, then the situation on the ground will change and there will be more opportunities available for people. And that was very useful to hear in the forum today, because there aren’t actually many avenues for people to complain – or if there is an avenue, then the process takes too long. I’ll try to capture this in my report and in my recommendations – I’m meeting with senior housing officials, housing ministers and federal ministers, and I’ll be raising these issues with them.

Can Australia’s homeless situation be readily compared with anywhere else in the world?

I think you have a similar situation here to the United States and Canada, where you have a dominant, liberal, economic model geared toward – and based on – home ownership that does not have enough safety-net provisions, or that does not look at the structural issues that cause homelessness. It’s as shocking to see here as it is in the US and Canada, because they’re all very wealthy countries. The other common feature in all three countries is that there is a reduction in subsidies and a reduction in the amount of social housing units available, partly related to pressure from the market, and perhaps from a squeeze using available resources for other areas and not social issues. I think, again, in all those countries it comes back to the issue of governments not recognising issues like housing as a human right. I think if they did that – if they based their policies and laws and programmes on that recognition – then the first step would be to look after the most vulnerable. You cannot have a situation where the most vulnerable people are left out, and where, in fact, the numbers are growing.

Are governments generally responsive to your reports?

It’s mixed: some are, some aren’t. In Australia’s case I’m hoping for a positive response, because I’m here on invitation and that indicates an opening. They also have to respond to my report formerly at the human-rights consulate in Geneva, and I’m hoping that whatever we can come up with will be useful for the kind of groups we met today, as well as for the state, territory and commonwealth.