WA Government housing officials kick kids onto streets as secret figures reveal full truth of family evictions

The WA Government department responsible for child protection and reducing homelessness has evicted more than 1000 families with children from social housing in the past five years — and has been accused of trying to cover-up the figures. Never-before released data obtained by The West Australian can reveal that in the five financial years since 2017-18, at least 1034 families with children have been evicted from social housing by the Housing Authority. The Housing Authority sits within the Department of Communities, which is also responsible for child protection and is meant to be a key part of the McGowan Government’s response to reducing homelessness. The West Australian can reveal the government has previously avoided releasing the full figures by labelling some evictions “voluntarily vacates” within its data. The Department is claiming that cases where social housing tenants with children have relinquished their properties following termination orders or court orders are not evictions. Aboriginal families are also being evicted at higher rates, making up more than half of all evictions, despite representing only 25 per cent of all social housing tenants. Lawyer and tenancy advocate Kate Davis said those working in WA housing sector had long raised concerns about Communities evicting Aboriginal families with children at high rates, but the Department was often not transparent with data. “At a time when the State Government says they are committed to ending homelessness, these evictions from public housing are fuelling the crisis,” Ms Davis said. “Childhood homelessness has devastating impacts — some of them lifelong. Interruptions to schooling means children can’t read or write, increased risks of violence in unsafe environments, developmental delay from the lack of security.” Ms Davis is currently representing a large Aboriginal family in a Human Rights Commission complaint over their public housing eviction. Noongar man John Abraham was issued an eviction notice by Communities last year. He currently has 20 people including 10 children living at his three-bedroom social housing property in Queens Park. “John doesn’t want all his family members living with him, but they would be on the streets if they didn’t stay with him,” Ms Davis told The West. “John has asked the Housing Authority to help house his family members, but they have refused the applications from his parents who are caring for grandkids and say others must wait in line.” Part of the legal case is arguing that the Abraham family are being discriminated against because of their race. Aboriginal families have cultural obligations to care for family and in cases like John’s overcrowding had created “rolling evictions”, Ms Davis said. “To evict families for overcrowding is obviously only making the problem worse. The Housing Authority should address overcrowding by providing priority housing, not evictions to the streets. The experience of having 15 homeless family members ask to shelter at your place is a particularly Aboriginal experience – no other group in our community has such high levels of homelessness,” she said. While the Federal Court has currently placed an injunction blocking the Abrahams’ eviction, the family say they are fearful about how the children will be able to complete schooling if it goes ahead. “It’s impacting them, it’s really impacting them. Schooling, their education, it’s really important for all of us,” grandmother Barbara Abraham said. An email sent from a Communities child protection worker to Ms Davis last year warned that while they believed Barbara was “doing her best” to care for her grandchildren in tricky circumstances, they were concerned about the family becoming homeless. The email had been sent eight weeks after the Department had issued the eviction notice. “One of our main concerns (is) that this family may soon become homeless and the implications that this will have on the children’s health and wellbeing,” the email stated. “(The grandmother) is currently working towards getting the children enrolled into Cannington College and she has spoken with me about her worries about the children being able to engage and learn in school when they know that they soon may not have a safe place to live and sleep.” When the State Government has previously been asked for figures on children being evicted from social housing it has only provided data for evictions where a bailiff was sent in. This included a response to a parliamentary Question on Notice last year for Housing Minister John Carey. Greens MP Brad Pettitt, who asked the original question, criticised the Government for evicting any families with children from social housing and said it was inaccurate to claim someone issued a termination notice or court order was “voluntarily” leaving. “Starting with the idea that we as a State are evicting children into homelessness, I think it’s absolutely abhorrent,” he said. “I’m not surprised the Government tries to disguise that with some tricky terminology.” A Department spokesperson stated in December only 12 children in nine public housing tenancies were evicted in the 2021–22 financial year. When asked by The West, however, about “voluntary vacates” Communities confirmed an additional 92 families with 209 children left public housing tenancies in 2021-2022 after being issued termination notices or court notices. Mr Carey told The West there had been a 90 per cent reduction in overall public housing evictions and insisted evictions were always a last resort. He said people who left public housing properties following termination notices or court orders were not evictions “as they are not final”. “Right up until the point where there is an eviction, and the locks are changed, tenants still have the opportunity to change their behaviour and engage with the Department of Communities to sustain their tenancy,” he said. While most tenants had no complaints made against them, there was sometimes “no choice” but to evict people, he said.