By Cam Lucadou-Wells
There’s no safe house for a terrified 61-year-old Dandenong West grandmother who was brutally bashed in her driveway by a former neighbour.
The public-housing tenant has sported a plaster cast on her broken hand and bruises to her eye and temple since the attack in broad daylight.
She wants ‘out’ from her drug-plagued neighbourhood, the daily dealing, intrusions and squatting.
But with a soaring public housing list, the Department of Families, Fairness and Housing tells her it has nowhere else for her to go.
“I’m not fine at all. I’m 61 years old and I’m too old for this s***.”
On the afternoon of Monday 26 September, she confronted a 28-year-old woman who was allegedly breaking into a next-door unit.
The screaming, yelling intruder repeatedly beat the grandmother to the face and temple, and broke the victim’s thumb while swinging her into the fence.
The attacker also rounded on a 72-year-old neighbour, who stepped into the fray.
“I thought (the alleged offender) was going to kill her,” he later said.
In her frenzy, the alleged offender punched the man’s pacemaker and spat on him several times. She also flung a street sign and a metal drain cover several metres at him.
The victims were both treated at hospital, and released that night.
They say their basher threatened both elderly victims that they would be killed.
The attacker was arrested, charged with two counts of assault and failing to answer bail and is set to appear at Dandenong Magistrates’ Court on 24 October.
The two victims say they are being worn down by a four-year pattern of drug-dealing and addiction in the neighbourhood, which surrounds Dandenong West Primary School.
Despite constant reports to Victoria Police, the problem persists.
At siege are the senior residents living in their four-unit public housing block – including several tenants in their 80’s.
Living alone, the grandmother says she’s too scared to leave her home. She’s barely slept since the attack.
“My neighbours and I are living in terror.
“It was absolutely the most disgusting thing that has ever happened to me.
“I don’t know why I made the decision to confront her. I was just sick and tired of what’s going on here and nothing being done about it.”
She wants to be transferred to a safer neighbourhood but has to join a long public housing queue.
Victorian Public Tenants Association Katelyn Butterss says a long-term plan is needed to address soaring public-housing wait lists.
Vulnerable Victorians in “terrible situations” are being forced to wait months for a property, Ms Butterss said.
“However the Government has no long-term solution to a problem that is only going to get bigger.
“We all deserve to feel safe and secure in our home.
“Everyone suffers as a result of the chronic underinvestment in public housing and community services, because help is not always available when it is needed.
“Waitlists for both housing and support from appropriate services are long, and people are pushed to the brink before they reach the front of the queue.”
In the Southern Metro region, including Dandenong, there is an escalating 5767 on the public housing waiting list – the top three for waiting times in the state.
More than half of the state’s waiting list are ‘priority’ – that is, in “urgent” risk of homelessness or with “important health and safety needs” that are unmet, Ms Butterss says.
“But the time it’s taking to get access to housing is getting longer and longer.
“The Government reports average wait times of around 14 months, but our experience is that most people wait much longer.”
Homelessness service Wayss is calling for the State Government to build 60,000 new social housing properties in Victoria over the next 10 years, including some “ringfenced” for the South East.
Chief executive Wayne Merritt said the estimated 120,000 public housing wait list in Victoria had swelled in the past five years.
“This means when someone is looking to be relocated or find a new public housing option, the wheels turn extremely slowly.”
Rentals in Melbourne’s South East were “tighter than ever” and “out of reach for so many people”.
“There is also huge rental stress out there for people who actually have a roof over their heads.
“Here at Wayss we have seen more people than ever before seeking assistance to pay their rent, including people who would not normally access our services.”
Mr Merritt praised the State’s $5.3 billion Big Housing Build of social and affordable housing.
“However this is just the beginning and there is so much more we can do.”
A State Government spokesperson said “we know there’s demand for social and affordable housing right across Victoria”.
The Big Housing Build would boost social housing supply by 10 per cent, the spokesperson said.
“Waiting times for social housing are dependent on a number of factors, such as the number and the types of properties available, the demand in the areas an applicant wants to live and how many people have been approved under the priority access.”
Opposition housing spokesperson Richard Riordan said urgent public housing wait lists “ballooned” by more than 330 per cent in eight years.
“More than 33,000 Victorian families do not have a safe home to go to each night.
“Alarmingly, more than 500 Victorian families are added to the waiting list every quarter, and are forced to sleep in tents, vehicles or in short term accommodation.
“At a time when billions have been spent on over-budget tunnels around the city, Victorians have been left with an underfunded and ballooning housing shortage.
“A home for all Victorians is one of the most simple commitments a caring and responsible government ought to be able to keep.”
