A windfall for Vic Labor's developer's mates

October 31, 2025

Stewart Sweeney’s essay on the Australia-wide abandonment of public housing, by Labor Governments in particular, is timely. Here in Victoria, following through on Dan Andrews’ departing thought bubble, the demolition of 44 public housing towers has begun.

Literally as I write, a small but staunch group of protesters is picketing a tower in Flemington, Melbourne, where Housing Victoria (a misnomer if ever there was one) is evicting the remaining residents and moving them far from their community to “temporary” accommodation.

The demolitions, and the building of “social and affordable” housing in their place, have been assessed by a range of experts. The project fails spectacularly on financial, social and climate grounds. Almost all the buildings could be retrofitted to bring them up to 21st century standards. ( discussion here). In purely financial terms, the project will be a waste of $5 billion.

This destruction of the lives of 10,000 people by the Victorian Labor Government serves only two purposes: a windfall for the government’s developer mates and the effective end of the provision of public housing in Victoria by this radically centrist neoliberal government.