Family's housing transfer rejected.

(From Canberra Times)

ACT law and government policy designed to protect children and families have not helped one disadvantaged family obtain a priority transfer out of a violent and drug and alcohol-dominated public housing complex in Belconnen.

Although strongly sympathetic, the ACT Administrative Appeals Tribunal has ruled that the situation of a woman and her two young children was not so dire that they were entitled to a priority transfer from Illawarra Court to a three-bedroom house.

ACT Law Society president Bill Redpath, who represented the woman at the tribunal, argued that she was entitled to special treatment because of the provisions of the recently enacted Human Rights Act, the first of its kind in Australia, and one of the Government's key social policy documents, the 2004 Canberra Social Plan. Mr Redpath argued that the human rights laws provided that the family unit and children were entitled to society's protection, and that the social plan identified a safe environment as a major community priority. The woman - who has children aged 2 and 5 - has been approved and been on the waiting list for a transfer since early 2002.

She gave evidence of frequent fighting among tenants, most of whom are single men, screaming and foul language, drunkenness, drug use and discarded syringes. She had found blood, vomit ...