Search or view whole report

View PDF

Legal issues facing homeless people in NSW

A salient theme concerning legal issues identified in this report is that, at any one time, homeless people tend to have multiple and interrelated legal problems, which if left unaddressed can further exacerbate homelessness. That said, the range of legal issues people face may vary as they move through homelessness. First, it appears that the incidents leading to homelessness often have, at least in part, legal implications. These may include:

• family law issues reflecting family breakdown
• domestic violence
• housing-related legal issues, including housing debt, eviction and problems re-entering housing due to being placed on residential tenancy databases
• outstanding debt-related legal issues reflecting financial disadvantage and chaotic lives
• unlawful discrimination preventing people from maintaining financial and accommodation security.

Indeed, for some people, the path into homelessness is the product of a number of compounding incidents, such as an injury or illness, loss of work, loss of income, debt, family breakdown and, finally, losing housing. Thus, legal assistance when these events occur may in fact prevent or reduce the risk of people becoming homeless.

Secondly, homelessness itself also places people at risk of experiencing particular legal issues. In turn, these issues can exacerbate the experience of homelessness and make it harder for people to regain housing. These issues include:

• problems complying with social security requirements
• vulnerability to crime victimisation as a result of a lack of secure housing
• legal issues related to their accommodation in boarding houses and caravan parks
• debt accumulated from fines
• being moved on by police, transit officers and council rangers as a result of their greater visibility and occupation of public space
• criminal law problems, including those relating to alcohol and other drug abuse.

It also seems to be the case that there are certain laws, policies, legal processes and practices that may aggravate homelessness or leave people vulnerable to it. Those identified in the current study include:

• the limited use of exclusion orders by local courts in AVO applications. Exclusion orders enable victims of domestic violence to remain in their home while excluding their violent partners
• the recent introduction of renewable tenancy agreements and acceptable behaviour agreements, which allow DOH to evict people on the basis of ‘anti-social’ behaviour. These amendments may potentially increase the risk of homelessness for public housing tenants with complex needs (e.g. people with a mental illness or families with children with behavioural or other disabilities)
• the use and structure of residential tenancy databases. Unregulated until very recently, numerous stakeholders noted the impact of residential tenancy databases on homeless people trying to re-access the rental market. New regulations do not prohibit the use of these databases, but do allow some protection against their arbitrary and unfair use by landlords and real estate agents
• the lack of tenancy protection for boarders and lodgers and limited protection to marginal residents of caravan parks under the Residential Tenancies Act 1987 (NSW), which leave these groups vulnerable to arbitrary eviction and unsanitary and dangerous living conditions. As boarding houses and caravan parks close down, there is an increasing shortage of available accommodation. People report not complaining about sub-standard accommodation as they may have no alternatives if they are evicted as a result of the complaint
• Due to their public visibility, many homeless people, particularly young homeless people often receive multiple fines for offences such as littering, transport fines and other offensive behaviour. They also have difficulty negotiating the multi-agency process (e.g. the IPB, the SDRO and the Roads and Traffic Authority) to pay or challenge these fines. Consequently, people can accrue significant debts, which hinder their ability to exit homelessness. The link between non-traffic related fines (e.g. littering) and the suspension of driver licences and/or the cancellation of car registration also leaves people vulnerable to further offending (e.g. driving without a licence).

While legal assistance can help homeless people to address their legal issues, this study has found that homeless people face a number of barriers in gaining access to legal assistance.