Renters are baking in dangerously hot homes every summer, and it’s getting worse. Climate change means hotter summers and longer, hotter and more frequent heatwaves. This is bad news for everyone, but especially renters, who are more likely to live in poorly built, low energy efficient homes with no power to make changes to the properties they live in.
In May this year, the NSW Government considered whether there should be Minimum Energy Efficiency Standards for rental homes in our state. We think this is a no-brainer; everyone deserves to live in an affordable, safe, and healthy home.
In order to get this across the line, we needed to demonstrate how broadly minimum standards were supported. This means we needed to build a huge campaign that brought together renters from all walks of life, and brought non-renters into the campaign to show support that was impossible to ignore.
At the conclusion of the public consultation, over 1813 voices were represented in submissions across the state. We held 8 events in person and online to meet as many people through this campaign as possible, and to help community members make a submission – for many, this would be their very first! Here are some highlights from the campaign, and what we are working on post-consultation.
We ran 2 online submission workshops in partnership with our friends in the Sydney Alliance. 75+ people registered for these workshops, and together, we made the submission process as simple as possible. On the very last day of the campaign, our Sweltering Cities team attended the Discernment Convention where we delivered our final submission session of the campaign. How powerful!
Our team also travelled all over to host community events, bridging the gap between political participation, and voices that we knew needed to be heard in this process. We hosted workshops in Redfern, Parramatta, and even Wollongong! Renters in different areas were fully behind minimum standards, but renters in the Illawarra had clear concerns about mould and rust, while renters in Western Sydney were primarily concerned about housing affordability and extreme heat. We made these concerns front and centre in our own submission – the cost of housing standards cannot be passed on to renters, and proposed minimum standards must be grounded in what communities want!
We spoke to hundreds of people on the phones, in the streets, and at events – it’s clear that minimum standards for thermally safe homes in an increasingly hot climate have broad support. In fact, it would be silly if minimum standards were not passed at all.
The work continues post consultation, and we are looking to keep up this pressure with direct conversations with MPs. Are you a renter or care about a renter? We will be meeting with NSW State MPs all the way up to November – to get involved in this action, get in touch with taylor@swelteringcities.org
