WELFARE groups and community houses on the Mornington Peninsula’s are facing unprecedented demand for free meals and food packages, as a result of homelessness and cost of living rises.
The lingering impacts of the pandemic have left people struggling to make ends meet and charities are having to fill in the gaps.
A growing number of homeless people are also lining up for food as the peninsula faces a shortage of affordable rental properties.
It is estimated that 1000 people are homeless every night on the peninsula, being forced to sleep in their cars, tents or couch surfing.
Earlier this month Mornington Peninsula Shire called on state Housing Minister Danny Pearson to review regulations that allowed holiday houses and “party houses” to operate “to the detriment of longer term rental options”.
At their 6 September meeting councillors will receive a report on how much it will cost to write to non-resident ratepayers “asking them to consider putting their peninsula dwellings onto the local rental market as an immediate solution to the housing crisis”.
Real estate agents will also be asked to support the shire’s actions to free up more houses for rent.
Cr David Gill said it would “go a long way” to helping ease the crisis if “just 100 of the estimated 4000 available houses were made available for rent”.
He said offering “incentives” such as cutting Land Tax to owners of multiple dwellings “would be a lot cheaper [for the state government] than building social housing”.
A forum organised Peninsula Voice last Wednesday heard that people were being forced to move away from their social network and health providers because they could no longer afford rents.
The first in a series of three forums at the Peninsula Community Theatre was centred on discussing circumstances that lead to homelessness. The next forum on 8 November will cover housing affordability.
Peninsula Voice president Peter Orton said many people in the community wanted to help ease the housing crisis.
Ben Smith from Mornington Information and Community Support Centre said, “the energy in the room showed just how much this community wants action”.
“When this many people [and estimated 300] come out to discuss something like homelessness, on a cold midweek evening, it’s hard to deny the motivation people have to work together to build positive outcomes,” he said.
Some charities and groups involved in providing meals and food packages have reported a more than doubling of demand in the past six months as families are hit with rising power bills with less cash left for groceries.
Smith said the Mornington centre’s cafe, which provides free food in a social environment, was seeing up to 80 people a day, compared to 20 five months ago.
“We’ve certainly seen an increase in need, our community cafe is really about tackling isolation and wellbeing, but we just keep seeing more and more people needing a meal,” he said.
Hastings Community Centre’s Lisa Glover said her centre was also seeing an increase in demand and she had noticed a change in the type of people needing help.
“There has been a clear demographic shift in the past six months. We used to just get elderly people then, during the pandemic, we saw out of work men and co-parents, but now we are seeing lots of homeless people,” she said.
Capel Sound mental health advocate Shane Willis said welfare agencies and community houses did a great job providing food and support for needy families.
“These people are the unsung heroes of the current cost of living crises,” he said.
“We have the tireless workers at Seawinds Community Hub in Capel Sound providing bacon and egg breakfasts, while charities Vinnies and Splash are looking out for people in need.
“There are so many charities helping, we should be recognising them.”
For people needing support or food, the Mornington Peninsula Shire website has a list of places to go and organisations to phone.
With Liz Bell
First published in the Mornington News – 30 August 2022
