Good afternoon friends and neighbours,
Inner West Council’s draft Affordable Housing Policy is now on public exhibition, awaiting your feedback, via submissions closing on 7th June.
We support more genuinely affordable housing in the Inner West. On reading the policy, many of us – and many of you, no doubt – were be left wondering:
- What does “affordable housing” actually mean?
- How much affordable housing are we really getting?
- When will it be built and ready for tenants?
- Who controls the money collected from developers?
- Will any of it even be delivered?
- And who will be able to afford it when it is?
Fair warning; we have tried to make this as simple as we can, but it is complex, so please stay with us…
Firstly, what does “affordable housing” actually mean?
Inner West Council considers housing to be unaffordable if it costs more than 30% of household income.
In practice, housing can be considered “affordable” if the rent is discounted to ~25% below market rate. In a new Inner West development, this may still result in very high rents, e.g. $750 per week would be considered affordable for a newly built 2BR unit in Marrickville (renting normally at $1000 per week).
Housing providers can then find households with enough income to afford the ‘affordable’ unit without spending more than 30% of their income on rent, so it is deemed affordable.
This means most of the housing produced under this policy would primarily cater to ‘moderate-income’ households (at least $170,000 per annum), while people on very low incomes or in severe housing stress are left out.
There is currently no minimum amount of ‘affordable’ housing delivered using Council funds that need to be made available to households on low & very low incomes, which are the people who need genuinely affordable housing.
OUR RECOMMENDATIONS
To ensure our most vulnerable community members are housed, the policy must require:
- A minimum of 50% of affordable housing is allocated to low and very low income households.
- Affordable Housing Policy requirements are strengthened, in order to tie rents to a maximum of 30% of household incomes, which cannot be exceeded.
- Housing to be managed by a range of community housing providers, to provide the diversity and range of affordable housing solutions we need in the Inner West.
Secondly, how much affordable housing are we actually getting in the “Fairer Future” Plan?
In this policy, the current base affordable housing contribution rate is only 2% of gross floor space on larger developments.
This can be paid in cash or in-kind (dwellings).
THIS POLICY DRAFT CUTS THE AFFORDABLE HOUSING CONTRIBUTION ON ADDITIONAL FLOORSPACE IN HALF
In September 2025, at their Extraordinary Meeting, the Council promised a 20% affordable housing contribution for additional floorspace. This is already an extraordinary windfall to developers, given the low cost involved in adding floorspace.
Council has now reduced that amount to a mere 10%.
And it gets worse:
This contribution ONLY applies to BONUS floorspace “above existing planning controls”. This means that if the developer is allowed to build up higher or wider than the (already generous) FFP allows, they pay a paltry 10% contribution on that additional floorspace.
This policy allows developers to make millions, while the community gets spare change (and much larger buildings).
OUR RECOMMENDATION
Council should increase the percentage of Affordable Housing contributions for additional floorspace to 20%, in line with their September 2025 commitment.
Thirdly, how are the contributions delivered – cash or ‘in-kind’?
Cash contribution process in summary:
- Developers pay a contribution to Council, which pools the funds.
- Funds are transferred to a nominated Community Housing Provider (CHP)* which will own the funding and property CHP is responsible for delivering the affordable housing (no timeline provided).
In-kind contribution process in summary:
- Developers build the housing as part of the development.
- Built housing is transferred to Council.
- Council transfers housing management to a nominated Community Housing Provider (CHP)*.
Council’s preferred approach is for developers to pay cash contributions, rather than directly providing affordable units or buildings.
This will be a surprise to many people, who will see promotions for a new development and imagine that the affordable housing will be part of the build.
Since cash is preferred, this immediately raises some fairly obvious questions:
- How soon will the affordable housing be delivered?
- Where will it be located? (e.g. it may not be in the same part of the LGA where affordable housing has been demolished for development)
- And who is accountable to the public? Council or CHP?
Importantly, the detailed “Governance and Distribution Framework” which is supposed to explain how the funds will be managed, distributed and reported on has not yet been developed.
In other words, residents are currently being asked to support the proposed collection and transfer model before the detailed governance rules are available.
*The draft policy also proposes that initially only one nominated Tier 1 housing provider may receive and manage contributions for a minimum five-year term.
By transferring all of Council’s housing assets and contribution funds to a single Tier 1 housing provider, Council will:
- Give away public funds and assets to an external provider to own and use as they please
- Lose all control of where and when the affordable housing is provided
- Remove the option of working with other housing providers which could provide more diverse housing solutions, e.g. women’s housing, homelessness shelters, disability housing.
- Take years to build up the funds needed for large-scale development, further delaying the delivery of the promised affordable housing.
Submissions close Sunday 7th June, so your input is needed quickly.
Write a submission and send it to: planning@innnerwest.nsw.gov.au
Complete the feedback form on the ‘Your Say’ of the Inner West Council Website (note you have to join first): https://yoursay.innerwest.nsw.gov.au/draft-affordable-housing-policy
FULL LIST OF BFC RECOMMENDATIONS FOR SUBMISSIONS:
- Council should increase the percentage of Affordable Housing contributions for additional floorspace to 20%, in line with their September 2025 commitment.
- A minimum of 50% of affordable housing should be allocated to low and very low income households, to ensure the most vulnerable members of our community are guaranteed housing.
- Mandate that rents charged must not exceed 30% of household income, to ensure affordable housing is ACTUALLY affordable.
- Make contributions available to all types and sizes of community housing providers (not just Tier 1), to provide the diversity and range of affordable housing solutions we need in the Inner West.
- Release the Draft Governance and Distribution Framework alongside the Affordable Housing Policy, providing:
– clear timelines for the delivery of affordable housing
– dictating where housing will be provided (when contributions are made in cash rather than in-kind)
– clarification on which body is accountable to the community (Council or CHP)
Please make your submission before 7th June. Even a short submission will make a difference.
