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Fiji Wage Council chairman and poverty advocate Father Kevin Barr has called on government to re-look the roles played by Housing Authority and the Public Rental Board as there was “a very real danger” that their commercialization would go against their intended role to provide housing for the poor.
Barr said allowing the two state companies to operate along commercial lines and charging market rates and market rents may make good economic sense but if a high percentage of the population could not afford to pay these rates, there was a serious need to question how they would be provided with affordable homes.
“In 1997 when, on the advice from the World Bank, the HA and PRB were separated, the World Bank advisor who came to Fiji said that the PRB must charge economic rents for its rental units. This meant that rents for those living in the Four Storey flats at Raiwaqa would pay $58 a month instead of $12 a month. Someone asked: ‘What happens to those who cannot afford to pay the increased rent?’ The reply was: ‘Just flush them out.’ Many were horrified that this unfeeling, economic/commercial attitude should dominate the man’s thinking. He didn’t seem to be concerned where people went if they couldn’t pay. He didn’t think of the social consequences. His attitudes were dominated by principles such as ‘user pays’ and the theories of ‘economic rationalism’ and ‘free market economics,’” Barr said.
“If HA and PRB are to be relevant in today’s world, they need to do careful research to find out what ‘low income’ really means so that their products can be affordable to this group.
“With such a high level of poverty in the country, over 35 percent, and such a large number of full time workers receiving wages below the poverty line (between 55 and 60 percent) and 71 percent of workers earning incomes below $15,000, serious reassessment of the demands placed on HA and PRB is needed,” Barr added.
Among the many ways that housing could be made affordable to the poor, Barr suggested the provision of government subsidies as well as getting the poor to participate in schemes to build houses, thereby reducing costs.
