Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Speaker A: Please be aware this episode of Unhoused contains discussion around bushfires which may be distressing for some listeners.
Welcome to Unhoused Voices from the Threshold, a podcast exploring homelessness and housing in the Bega Valley Shire, New South Wales.
The makers of this podcast would like to acknowledge and pay our respects to the traditional custodians of the lands, waterways and airspace across the Beaker Valley on which we have made this work.
Welcome to episode four of Voices from the Threshold.
In this episode we explore the effects of disasters such as bushfires on our community and on the already stretched affordable housing situation in the Beaker Valley.
For this episode we speak with Jan, who along with her family, lost their home in the Tathra and district fire in 2018.
Ruth, a woman whose property was completely razed in the Black Summer bushfires. And Jo, a woman who was impacted and mobilised to form Bushfire Survivors for Climate Action.
I've included many links to research papers, organisations and statistics around this topic in the show. Notes Please note that there is a small amount of language used in this episode.
Before we hear from our interviewees, we again get out and about canvassing the opinions and awareness of the people of the Bega Valley.
Hi there. Can I ask you if you know if there's homelessness in the Bega Valley?
[00:01:50] Speaker B: Yes, there is. Definitely.
[00:01:53] Speaker A: You're quite young, aren't you? So how do you know this?
[00:01:56] Speaker B: Because some of my friends and family struggle with that.
[00:02:01] Speaker A: Oh. How can you tell us how and what help they receive?
[00:02:05] Speaker B: There's not much in the way of accommodation for them. There's obviously people to talk to in the Bega Valley, but yeah, I have a lot of them stay at mine quite a bit.
[00:02:19] Speaker A: That's really good of you.
Do you think we need a youth refuge in the Bega Valley?
[00:02:24] Speaker B: Yes, 100%.
[00:02:27] Speaker A: Are you aware of homelessness in the Bega Valley?
[00:02:30] Speaker C: Yes, I am.
[00:02:31] Speaker A: Have you seen evidence of it or.
[00:02:33] Speaker C: I do have first hand experience with seeing homelessness in the Bega Valley and it's in the form of people camping rough in sand dunes and beaches, that sort of thing. So I've seen that up and down the coast actually.
[00:02:46] Speaker D: How far?
[00:02:47] Speaker A: What distances?
[00:02:49] Speaker C: Yerbadala, Merimbula, Bernagui, Eden.
[00:02:53] Speaker D: Yep.
[00:02:54] Speaker A: And what, what do you think could or should be done to alleviate the situation in the Bega Valley?
[00:02:59] Speaker C: In the Bega Valley? I think making alternative housing easier to come by. It's so difficult. I actually don't know the answer.
[00:03:09] Speaker A: Hi, I just wanted to ask you if you know about the homelessness situation in the Bega Valley?
[00:03:15] Speaker E: Not enough.
I don't know enough about it.
[00:03:19] Speaker A: Right. So do you suspect there is more homelessness than. Okay, yeah.
[00:03:24] Speaker E: And we hear about older women in particular in cars, but I'm not aware about.
We just had a conversation about there not being a youth refuge. I would have assumed there would be one because I know that we would need one.
[00:03:42] Speaker A: Yeah, that's true. There is none.
Nor a men's Refuge.
On March 18, 2018, a tree blew into power lines in an easement in Reedy Swamp. Taking hold in 90 minutes, the fire burned through 1250 hectares of land as it travelled the 14 kilometres to Tathra, helped by wind gusts of almost 80 kilometres an hour and a temperature of almost 38 degrees Celsius until a southerly wind change in the late afternoon slowed the fire down. 65 homes were destroyed. Additionally, 39 homes were damaged along with 35 cabins and caravans and over 150 firefighters battled flames and ember attack, saving around 810 homes. Then came the Black Summer fires, when Australia lived through a fire season unlike any before, one that had started early in September 2019 and had burned and destroyed without reprieve for nearly five months. During the Black Summer bushfires in the bega Valley alone, 467 homes were destroyed and around 1000 sheds and outbuildings were also lost.
The fires also tragically claimed four lives in our valley during 2025. So far we have seen severe flooding further north. Experience and watched as other natural disasters have impacted communities across Australia and the world.
In June, a report was released by the University of New South Wales which highlights a growing problem, the intersection of the housing crisis and post disaster homelessness.
Our housing market is already under immense strain. Rents are rising faster than incomes, vacancy rates are at record lows and social housing is in sh.
Indeed, the waiting list for social housing in the Bega Valley can reach up to 10 years.
Disasters are only going to make things worse. In her response to the report, Dr. Lisa Ewinson from How We Survive noted people who were already homeless before a disaster are often invisible in recovery efforts. The report for which I've provided a link in the show notes highlights examples from the Northern River's floods and the Black Summer fires, where emergency housing was prioritised for homeowners while renters and rough sleepers were left with fewer options.
Every year since 2009, close to 23,000 Australians aged over 15 have been displaced because of housing damage caused by floods, bushfires and cyclones or storms.
Andrew Coghlan of the Australian Red Cross has described the situation as a compounding crisis.
He says, quote, what we're seeing is the collision of climate change impacts with an already stretched housing system.
Every extreme weather event now has the potential to push more people into homelessness.
Disasters create enormous challenges for homelessness services.
Kate Colvin is CEO of Homelessness Australia and warns that the nation's most vulnerable citizens are bearing the brunt of of housing disruption.
She says, quote, we're seeing a hierarchy emerge where people who lose housing assets in disasters get support, whilst those who are already sleeping rough, couch surfing or in crisis accommodation are pushed further to the margins.
[00:07:46] Speaker F: Every time I see another family that's lost a home in either flood or fire, I know what they're going to go through. I know how difficult their life is going to be and I know how heartbroken they are.
And what we're seeing is more and more and more Australians, just like my family, lose everything and have to start again and pick up the pieces.
[00:08:19] Speaker A: So you're about to meet Jan, who, along with her family, lost their home in the Tathra bushfires of 2018.
During this interview, Jan mentions BAL40 and flame zone. These are the highest risk zones.
BAL40 indicates a very high risk, while Balfz, or Flame zone is the utmost risk where properties face direct flame exposure. During a bushfire, we caught up with Jam in her beautiful new home built on the original property near Reedy Swamp outside Tathra.
Tell me there must have been after the Tathra fires where 69 or 70 homes were lost. There must have been a lot of people looking for somewhere to live. At the same time as you, a.
[00:09:08] Speaker F: Couple of things happened. There was a lot of people that were homeless because of that fire. There's also people moving into the area. So, you know, the hospital's always looking for accommodation.
We often don't get hospital staff because they can't find permanent accommodation.
So, yeah, it has traditionally been a tight rental market, so certainly we were lucky because we're new people and, you know, in the end we had four rentals. We ended up in a friend's granny flat. That was our last year. By that point, our son had moved into a group house in Morumbula.
But come the 1920 fires, there were less rental properties because people from the Tathra and District fires, they were still homeless. You know, it takes a long time. So the community hadn't recovered from that fire and then you've got another disaster on top of it. So sort of impounding the issues with Finding a rental property and for lots of areas, a lot of houses, especially around here, coastal, and they're holiday lets and. And they just weren't being used as accommodation for people because. Because it's an indefinite amount of time. So we, we moved four times in the period it took to rebuild.
[00:10:36] Speaker A: So how was that for you?
I mean you've lost your home now you're having to pick up and move again and again.
[00:10:43] Speaker F: It was really hard work. Like the. Obviously moving the first one, Barrack street, you're not actually moving anything in.
[00:10:51] Speaker A: You had nothing to move in, I.
[00:10:52] Speaker F: Had nothing to move in. That was pretty weird, you know, so as you know, every time you move it costs you money and time and all that sort of stuff and it's just unsettling. And I think it's that having owned our own home for a really long time, going back to that vagary of being on the rental market and that in lots of ways you're quite powerless and you have somebody coming to inspect and look, I have to say that we had no issues with the real estate agent. We dealt with. They were polite, they were helpful. If something wasn't working, they got it fixed straight away, all that stuff.
But you're having rental inspections and so back into a world that we left a long time ago, you know, bought and had off our house a long time ago. Yeah. So just another thing that you're dealing with in a time when you're dealing with lots of stuff and you're feeling pretty disorientated with the world anyway. So. Yeah.
[00:11:51] Speaker A: And of course quite a chunk of the time you were trying to work around rebuilding your home. Quite a chunk of that time, almost two years was spent dealing with new boundaries and new asset protection zones.
[00:12:05] Speaker F: That's correct.
[00:12:06] Speaker A: New regulations.
[00:12:07] Speaker F: To be able to rebuild, we had to do a couple of things.
We needed to widen our driveway. We had to do a survey, just a land survey, a cultural survey, an anthropological survey, a botanical survey.
So about $30,000 worth of surveying, sort of get it across the line. We actually had to engage a solicitor, so. So another expense and another set of conversations and just more work. So a lot of time. So by the time we actually got to building the house, we were done, just done. We're just exhausted.
[00:12:45] Speaker A: So yeah, something we chatted about earlier was the insurance money. So if you've lost your home in a bushfire and it was insured, but there was still a mortgage being paid.
[00:12:56] Speaker F: On the property, the bank gets the money first. If you owe money, any money that's owed is taken out and it just goes straight, straight to the bank.
So you have a diminished pot of money to build in a building world that is more expensive and has different regulations than it did years ago.
And also the banking world is different. We're not lending in the same way we did before the global economic crisis. John and I would not have got a loan because of our age. We were fortunate we owned the house. Having said that, the insurance company gave us an offer over the phone. So there's lots of things people aren't informed of.
And you just, in this trauma state, you're not sleeping, you're not, you're worrying, you know, all this stuff, you. So they made an offer over the phone and my husband goes, no, I wanted him riding. And the guy goes, well, that'll slow it down. And John said, well, mate, I'm not going anywhere. And it was wrong. And it was wrong to a very substantial amount of money. So through my work with bushfire survivors, I've actually found out lots of information and Financial Services Australia, absolutely brilliant.
You can dispute the money that you get from an insurance company and you can dispute it for up to five years because of the type of home we had. So we had a mud brick house.
It was just to pay out. So for people that some insurers will say, no, you know, we'll rebuild it for you using our builder and stuff. So it, you know, so there's lots of, there's lots of nuanced stuff. So it's a really complicated area. It's. I don't think it's talked about enough publicly.
[00:14:59] Speaker A: Can you give us an idea of the difference in your insurance premiums before and after?
[00:15:05] Speaker F: Absolutely, because that's the bill I pay. The premium that we paid before the house burnt down was $1,162. I looked it up.
[00:15:15] Speaker A: Per annum?
[00:15:16] Speaker F: Yep, per annum. And we now paid the. Our last.
I paid last year was three, nine, so that's fourfold.
So we're being told that the insurance premiums are going up because of the disaster. So we. So there's one simple thing that the government could do that would instantly reduce that. We don't pay GST on our premiums. But the other thing is, how is it if the insurance companies are struggling, they have all posted record profits. What is the need for these huge premiums? So this year I would expect our premium to be, you know, well over $4,000.
So we can't afford to pay that in one lump sum.
So, you know, to spread it out over the year.
[00:16:04] Speaker A: But that's helpful for.
[00:16:05] Speaker F: That's helpful, but it's not helpful if it comes at an extra cost. So, you know, and the government should remove the GST on home insurance because we're going to end up with a society of people that are insured.
[00:16:19] Speaker A: So if you had decided not to come and rebuild back on your very beloved property, would you have been, would it have been easy to afford to move and build somewhere else at the time?
[00:16:33] Speaker G: It probably would have.
[00:16:36] Speaker F: We could have moved quite quickly because there wasn't that cost of building post.
[00:16:42] Speaker A: Covid you would have been looking before the 2020 bushfires.
[00:16:47] Speaker F: So if we, if we'd rebuilt then it would have been substantially cheaper.
So. And then of course the issue for a lot of people, like, we're really.
[00:16:58] Speaker A: Lucky you have lost your home. So it's not that lucky.
[00:17:03] Speaker F: So we'd had this builder replace our guttering and he approached me through a third person just because he heard the house had gone. If we needed any help, any building advice, if we wanted a builder. Oh, it's lovely. It really was. So he made sure that I didn't, you know, I didn't have to respond to him or whatever.
And so we employed him as our builder and he kept a spot in his book books for us while we went through the whole thing.
[00:17:38] Speaker A: That sounds really considerate.
[00:17:40] Speaker F: It was incredibly considerate. So we were very fortunate in that because that was really problematic for lots of people. Quite a few of the girls that I worked with at Hillgrove lost houses in 1925 and they couldn't get a builder.
So, you know, people see homelessness as this kind of flat space and there's just all this other stuff that's going on that. So. So those people who can't find a builder are taking up a rental property. It's only going to get worse. And look, it's great that there's some short term rental stuff because we have visiting mos come to the hospital, radiologists, Kitung will have visiting doctors come and stuff.
[00:18:24] Speaker D: So.
[00:18:24] Speaker F: And, and we are a tourist destination.
So you know, but somehow there's got to be a balance. So you know, the people that actually the community have, have somewhere to live and perhaps we, perhaps as a community we need to be less driven by the dollar and more driven by the community.
[00:18:50] Speaker A: So even though you didn't use homelessness services, you had to deal with a lot of bureaucracy.
[00:18:55] Speaker F: Yeah, we had to deal with an enormous amount of bureaucracy. We had to deal with council, we had to deal with the insurance company. We had to deal with state government, we had to deal with Aboriginal Land Service, we had to deal with crown lands or something. Yeah, crown lands, national parks. We had to deal with lawyers.
We know how to talk to people, we know how to apply things, we know how to fill out forms and stuff. We're really lucky because we know how to do that stuff. And even though we're quite capable. My husband's a web designer. Half the time the forms just. He'd just be like, oh, my God, this is just doing my head in. And we had access to computers and the Internet and stuff, and we were fucked by it, you know, absolutely emotionally and physically exhausted by it. So I can't imagine what it's like for people who don't know how to do those things and don't have access to a computer or the Internet. And we, we were. Had jobs and. And so looked good to these people in that kind of weird, you know, way. We were family people, you know, and.
[00:20:08] Speaker A: You were lucky in rentals, weren't you?
[00:20:10] Speaker F: We're really lucky in rentals. And, yeah, we knew people, but I also knew and, you know, knew a real estate agent who had said to me, you know, if you need a hand, shout out. I shouted out, and we got help.
So, as you know, Lisa, I'm part of Bushfires for Climate Action, and initially I kind of felt my voice was for the small and the private. But the small and the private is actually what we're losing in climate fuel disasters.
And the biggest motivator for me to keep going is every time I see another family that's lost a home in either flood or fire, I know what they're going to go through. I know how difficult their life is going to be, and I know how heartbroken they are.
And what we're seeing is more and more and more Australians, just like my family, lose everything and have to start again and pick up the pieces. And each time it happens, it's harder and harder. There's less rental properties, there's less builders available, there's less money.
So I just see these climate fuel disasters as a real sort of instigator of homelessness.
[00:21:43] Speaker A: On New Year's Eve 2020, Ruth fled her home and community to be closer to the coast with friends.
In the early hours of New Year's Day, her home actually burned to the ground.
And it's been a pretty tough five years.
You lost your home in the 2019, 2020 bushfires?
[00:22:09] Speaker D: Yes.
[00:22:10] Speaker A: And you were at. Where was your house? Which fire were you in?
[00:22:13] Speaker D: I'm in Quorma. And in kwama, we lost 14 houses, which apparently is a third of Kworma.
So I wasn't the only person and I was so grateful that there was a lot of Kwama left standing.
And as I say, I actually got to stay in a house that hadn't been burned in Quorma. And the most. Well, I got to stay in the studio in the backyard. And the most important part of that was the garden hadn't burned. And so I lived in a garden with lovely overhanging trees and things, which really significantly helped me in my healing process. Because my land was charred from one end to the other.
I ended up pre evacuating. I went to Bermagui because after the burning leaves started landing on my deck in the afternoon, I knew from prior experience in Gippsland with bushfires that that meant the fire was very close.
And I knew I wouldn't cope well with flames because I'm a highly sensitive, anxious kind of person in a drama.
But I didn't pack much. I don't know why. I only took three changes of clothes and the shoes I had on and my laptop and a guitar, and I headed into Bermagui to a friend's place, actually, out at Barriga Bay.
And then during that night, at three o' clock in the morning, a friend texted me and said, have you seen the fire map?
And he obviously thought I was still in Quorma, but I could see that huge projections of that fire were headed over the mountain, Mumbala and were headed towards Baragah Bay. So then I had to rouse everybody up in the house and got back in the car at about 6am and headed back into the surf club at Bermagui.
I had a series of places which I'd secured some accommodation and then in a studio, and I was using the kitchen in the house and the lounge room in the house. But those people used to come back from Canberra every three weeks and live in the house. So every three weeks I would pack up my stuff out of the kitchen at least, and my paperwork, which I'd spread out over the table and then move to another place for the Friday, Saturday, Sunday, so that then I could move back again.
[00:24:39] Speaker A: Every month you did that?
[00:24:41] Speaker D: I did that nearly every month.
And then sometimes the place that I moved to, they might have had people coming in for the weekend, so sometimes I couldn't go there either. So then another lady I knew offered me her shed that had no power out on the way to Yowri. And so sometimes it was A nicely fitted out little shed. But sometimes I would go to that shed and having no power just meant, you know, I couldn't have a shower that wasn't able to cook or store food in refrigeration. And that was eight months of moving probably about 20 or 30 times.
And in that time, the main thing that happened was I lost most of my energy. The moves took energy to pack the car and put your clothing in and turn up at another place and unpack it and then pack it again a few days later. And then after the trauma of the fire, you know, we didn't have a lot of energy anyway. So I think I really lost an enormous amount of energy. And that feeling of displacement, of not having a safe place to be and not knowing how long you'd be in each place for really wore down my mental and emotional health.
[00:26:01] Speaker A: When did you finally get settled into something?
[00:26:04] Speaker D: Well, then I got that last rental in Bermagua.
Well, that was the Christmas after one year after the fire.
[00:26:12] Speaker A: So kind of still in Covid land a little bit.
[00:26:15] Speaker D: Definitely still in Covid, yeah. And still really deep in fire trauma, all the moves. And when I went into the real estate agent to get the keys and take up that last rental, I burst into tears constantly still just at how many times I had to move and how much more I could push out of myself to survive. It was very close to Bears beach and I used to. The ocean is really profoundly healing for me and I used to go and walk on Bears beach. But of an evening, you'd walk along there and there'd be no lights on on all the houses along Bears beach and all the houses up on the hire drive and all these houses that are empty when so many people after the fires couldn't find a house. Disappointing that people, they didn't really understand the trauma and the shock of the fire and what it does to you and how desperately you just need some security for a while and how important that is to your mental well being.
And yeah, just sharing would have made a big difference to people's whole life.
Having insecure dwelling, as I say, a sense of displacement and not knowing where you'll be or if you can afford the next rent for those moving around.
I just find that's one of the hardest things, things to endure mentally and emotionally.
[00:27:45] Speaker A: You're living back on your property now, aren't you? In a. In a shed that you've.
[00:27:50] Speaker D: Yes.
[00:27:51] Speaker A: Made really comfy.
[00:27:52] Speaker D: I'm in my converted shed which I've got fireplace and I've made it into a mini house inside. But it's because it's a shed, it's. I've got a family of skinks living in there and I get mosquitoes every night. I've had to sleep under a mosquito net for four years and spiders and all that sort of stuff. But it is a place on my own land and I feel very privileged under the current circumstances to be there. But I am planning on building later this year because it's actually taken me the five years to get the energy to feel that I could face off all that. A building bolds.
[00:28:32] Speaker A: So in the five years art since the fires, how are people going? Are people a bit like you still feeling it? Very much.
[00:28:40] Speaker D: I think in those people that I talk to, there's quite a few people that still haven't built, often single women, but not only.
And often because we don't feel ready to take on the enormity of a build because we still aren't fully functioning energetically.
Other people I've heard that went in early and got a prefab home. I've heard that some of those are probably still now going through the trauma process of the fire. So in talking to the councillors and that around, apparently there's still a lot of process going on and five years is really only maybe two thirds to halfway through what we're being told is a seven to ten year process.
[00:29:31] Speaker A: Oh, is it? Wow.
[00:29:33] Speaker D: That's the stats from the bushfires in Victoria. If you were obviously a bit more on the ball, organised, maybe had built before or just had a flat piece of land that was easy to build on, or you found a design that worked for you. Those people that got in early, I think that made it must have made a big difference to the recovery, though I believe some of them are still going through different levels.
I do a bit of house sitting and I must say to get out of my shed so that I can go and have. And I always get surprised when I'm in a full size kitchen. I've got a separate bedroom and a lounge room with a tv and it's like, oh my God, you realize that you can function, you become functional and you realise, oh, I. I could plan things from a proper functioning house, but when I'm living in a small space with a lot of stuff shoved in me because I'm in the shed, the stuff that would be in a shed's kind of in the shed with me. Paint cans and things and clothing and bits of wood, leftover projects.
So it just don't function quite the Same.
And I know I just come from house sitting friends and I start cooking cakes and proper meals. I enjoy functioning. And then I come back home and as much as I love my space, I'm really looking forward to finally getting a place where I'm not all in one room.
[00:31:02] Speaker A: Can you tell me a little bit about your experience with the.
What were they called?
[00:31:06] Speaker D: The Pod.
[00:31:07] Speaker F: The pod.
[00:31:07] Speaker D: I think they were called the pod.
[00:31:09] Speaker A: Yeah, you had. That was quite an interesting experience for you and some others, wasn't it?
[00:31:14] Speaker D: Yeah, they've been converted into little living shelters for us, I guess. And I was told they were specifically made for the fire people because a lot of people thought they were the mining dongas, but I was told no, they were made in Adelaide for us. And they had a little bathroom. There was a toilet and a shower up one end and then there was a kitchen. There was a stove top with two gas cookers on it and there was a refrigerator, a reasonable sized refrigerator. And there was a washing machine and then at the other end there were four fold down metal bunk beds. And so most of us were deeply grateful that we had something, but it wasn't really a stable home.
[00:32:09] Speaker A: And how are you now, Ruth? How far away are you from.
From managing your built or feeling like you can manage your build? Are you still working towards that?
[00:32:19] Speaker D: Well, for the first time I'm actually looking forward to it. Not terrified of how much energy it will take from me though. I still feel like I'm probably only operating at about 75% of my energy level post fire because of the moving and living in a shed and mosquitoes and tradies and all the things that have to happen all the time until you're in a permanent dwelling.
But I'm looking forward to the build and I do feel very grateful and I feel deeply for homeless people because I've had a sense of what it's like and it's definitely a very challenging situation to be in.
[00:33:02] Speaker A: And as a healer, how are these things affecting people and people in the bushfires?
[00:33:10] Speaker D: Well, I'd say the number one thing it took moving around and not having security took so much energy from me. That energy I would have used just for my well being, I would have used in my own life, in my professional life, I would have used in my working life. I haven't been able to return to work because my work means I have to hold the space for other people and I haven't been able to hold it fully for myself.
[00:33:38] Speaker A: So you need to be at full energy to be able to do that.
[00:33:41] Speaker D: I do need because I've got to hold other people's stories. And the other thing I really noticed, it took from me the energy I would have given into my community. And I was a big community person. I've helped start dances and different things in the community. And so I was no longer able to contribute to the community and to people who, you know, other people who I might have thought were feeling a bit, I might have gone up and said, hey, how you going? How are you feeling now? I sometimes just detour from people because I know I'm still only really managing my own. So it really detracts from how much you can participate as a full member of a community. And then I think the whole of the community misses out because they don't understand that they're missing out on all that that person can offer in their work life, in their community life and their personal life. You go into a kind of self preservation mode and because you need to, because you haven't got any free energy to give anybody else.
And yeah, I feel that I'm still partly in that.
And this is five years later and I'm somebody who.
I've come as a therapist, I've come with a lot of skills. I've come fairly well equipped into the trauma.
But the constant moving and not securing somewhere has really played a toll on my ability to function.
[00:35:13] Speaker A: I wanted to just finish up asking you, just with a little overview. We did start off about the housing situation in Bermagui. It's itself that you've noticed, you've observed a few things and you've been there. Tell me, why was the place you got the last rental in Bermagui?
[00:35:31] Speaker D: I think it was December. So obviously the holiday rentals were on. So a lot of places were under holiday rental, a lot of places for Airbnb.
And yeah, there just really wasn't anything else available. So I, you know, I really find that all the empty houses in Bermagui, when once everybody had a house and there wasn't a crisis then I think that's, you know, possibly a way to enjoy your wealth.
But when there's so many people living in cars and unable to pay their rent and I know firsthand the mental, physical trauma that creates. I really feel so many people who have these second houses need to, to open up their hearts and minds and look at doing some long term rentals for people to get us through this really challenging time.
[00:36:29] Speaker A: We managed to track down Jo, a neighbour of Jan's on Vimy Ridge, who was impacted by the Tathra fire and the sense of needing to find somewhere safe.
She was mobilised to form Bushfire Survivors for Climate Action.
[00:36:50] Speaker G: I suspect that in urban areas people are not aware of the enormity of the impact when people are losing homes due to climate fuel disasters, which of course are increasing. So in urban areas people don't experience that and there's possibly a perception that it's just a, you know, a fire destroys 10 homes or 50 homes, but in a, in the context of a city that isn't that much and there's more options. Whereas in the context of a region, they, those homes will go in a certain area and that will impact that region significantly because it'll be a bigger proportion a and often those homes go in a specific place so the entire population of that place is impacted. At the same time.
There's a couple of things. One, and I have to get this, this one off my chest, and I mentioned it to you the other day, and that is that after the disasters, well, after the Tathra fire.
In my personal experience after the Tathra fire, what we saw was an upswelling of generosity where people were saying, here's a home, come and stay in my holiday house, or, you know, use, use the, you know, the lower floor or whatever it was. So lots of people did get accommodated through the generosity of people.
And I thought, that's great, isn't that lovely? Isn't it nice that we as a community can, can do that and, and extend that generosity to people that we knew and also to strangers? And that's lovely. But my second thought was that there were already homeless people before that fire and we didn't extend that generosity to them.
We just queue jumped people who just lost their houses. And the reason we did it is because there was something more sexy about people who had a house that burnt down and needed a house than people who were couch surfing or sleeping in the car with the kids or, you know, unwashed as a result. I'm not sure why we feel that way, but we do. So that's one thing we need to first consider what parity of need and our response to that is, because as the climate warms and we're already past 1.5 degrees and we're heading towards 3 or 4, if we don't do some quick, smart turnaround and we're not actually aimed at that yet, so a lot of work needs to be done. But if we don't turn that around and the disasters increase, we're going to.
[00:39:22] Speaker F: See.
[00:39:25] Speaker G: Not just a steady climb, but a rapid and increasingly rapid escalation in homelessness as the sheer numbers of homes available are destroyed. And not just the physical destruction, but the change in landscape and safety of place that will prevent homes being rebuilt where they were before.
And the problem with the insurance and regulation sector, that's also going to get in the way. There's so many things that are all going to come with increasing speed and severity at us, and we're going to end up with more and more people in that situation getting, you know, destroyed by their experience. So we.
The sooner we get onto this, because you can't build houses overnight, the sooner we get on to turning that ship and particularly turning people's minds to the problem of equity in the right to a safe home.
And having that conversation.
[00:40:26] Speaker F: I go through.
[00:40:28] Speaker G: The pangs every time I see a homeless person in the street. Not here, but there's a few people walk around who've got them, you know, clearly not living in functional housing. I've never understood how we as a society with all that wealth can be stepping past those people.
[00:40:49] Speaker A: Thank you for listening to episode four of Voices from the Threshold.
Please see the show notes for more information about some of the organisations and research listed and links to services. We hope you'll join us again next time.
This podcast series was made possible with funds from the New South Wales Premier's Department Social Cohesion Grants, as obtained by the Bega Valley Shire Council for the shire's library service.
