The Coalition has entrenched health inequities by failing on housing during COVID-19, an Australian National University report says.
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The ANU has released its health equity report card, ranking federal and state responses to the pandemic across housing, employment, and income support.
Report author Sharon Friel found while state and territory governments outperformed their federal counterpart, "more needs to be done across the board" to reduce health inequity.
Professor Friel said health inequities were primarily the result of policies outside the health sector, describing COVID-19 as a "missed opportunity" to improve the system.
The federal government in June 2020 created the HomeBuilder grant, giving people $25,000 to complete renovations or new home builds.
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But the report found the main beneficiaries were the already-wealthy, arguing it exacerbated inequality.
"[It's] worse than useless when it comes to health inequity, because it privileges those who've already got the homes and are in a position to do renovations," Prof Friel said.
"Affordable, good quality public housing is needed instead."
The Coalition received a C - defined as "maintaining the status quo" - on income support and employment.
Prof Friel claimed the JobSeeker program, which ran between March 2020 and March 2021, was short-lived and "changed nothing in the long-term".
She said the majority of employment policies provided new funding to businesses.
"While useful stopgap measures to keep people employed, they fail to address precarious employment and act to maintain the status quo: doing nothing to improve health equity," she said.
The ACT received a 'B' for housing, defined as "good for health equity", the highest ranking given alongside Tasmania and Western Australia.
But the territory received just a C+ on income support and a C for employment.
Housing has been a contentious issue throughout the pandemic.
Labor has demanded federal intervention on social housing, though the Coalition has argued it was primarily the responsibility of the states.