The global financial crisis has waylaid the plans and ambitions of governments around the world, and while many are now learning to cut their coats according to their cloth, some continue to cling stubbornly to plans and initiatives that look increasingly untenable in the face of changed economic circumstances. The ACT Government, which continues to insist that its land rent scheme (introduced last July) is viable and worthy of continued support, seems to be one of them.
In theory at least, the scheme offered a promising means of enabling more low-income home buyers to enter the private property market: allow them to rent a block of land from the Government, leaving them with just the cost of building the house. With new housing construction having a substantial multiplier effect, there was likely to be a net benefit to the ACT economy, too.
Chief Minister Jon Stanhope insists several financial institutions gave assurances they would support the scheme when it was first proposed. While no doubt true, the advent of the global credit squeeze has clearly led to a change of view.
Of the dozens of people who have signed up to the land rent scheme, none have yet managed to secure a loan.
Given that lending money on a depreciating asset such as a dwelling (without security of some kind, such as the land on which it is built) is a problematic proposition for a bank or financial institution, their reluctance is perhaps understandable. Why such reservations were not more forcefully expressed when Stanhope was putting the policy together in the first place is not clear. Perhaps the banks simply did not envisage the end of cheap lines of credit.
But dry up they have, and, as a consequence, there are suggestions the Government could be forced to compensate people unable to secure a mortgage by June30, when the Commonwealth is expected to end its first-home owner's grant scheme. The global credit crisis has already impinged on the Ownplace program (another initiative of Labor's Affordable Housing Action Plan) with the Government forced to refund home buyers who signed up for house and land packages in the expectation that they could postpone payments for their packages for a maximum of 12 months or until the house was built.
The Government's commitment to allowing as many Canberrans as possible to share in the dream of home ownership is both laudable and worthwhile, and it is certainly not its fault that the financial crisis has affected some of its initiatives.
It is to be hoped that the ''major financial institution'' of which Stanhope has spoken emerges to make the land rent scheme a goer, because at the moment it looks moribund. Rather than arguing otherwise, the Government might be better off looking at other ways of encouraging housing activity; by loosening the supply of land, for example.
Right to assistance
Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people have perished accidentally in the Australian bush, often because they did not prepare adequately for the harshness of the terrain. Tragically, David Iredale is one them. The Sydney schoolboy, who died during a hike in the Blue Mountains in December 2006, may have underestimated the heat and stress of bushwalking in a summer heatwave, but he could never have anticipated the indifference of those he turned to for help when in extremis.
Using his mobile phone, Iredale repeatedly called triple-0, Australia's primary emergency call service. But instead of sending help, the operators became irritated at his inability to provide a street address. They talked over the top of him, and failed to elicit the kind of information that might have led to his rescue. They failed to take proper notes of the conversations, and they failed to pass on details of the call to the police, who might have organised a search party or a helicopter rescue.
The circumstances that led to David's death, revealed in a coronial inquest, have led the NSW Deputy State Coroner to make a number of recommendations, including calls for a widespread review of the training and protocols for emergency call operators.
It is reported that many emergency operators around Australia work long shifts without adequate breaks, that they are inexperienced and receive no first aid or paramedic training.
Certainly, it cannot be easy dealing with stressed, panicked or frightened callers, or indeed handling prank or hoax calls.
Nevertheless, people calling 000 have a right to expect their pleas for help to be dealt with efficiently, attentively and with a modicum of sympathy, which is why it behoves authorities, not just in NSW but around the country, to heed the coroner's recommendations.
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