“I’m just devastated,” he said on Friday morning. Last June, Schrinner put $1 million on the table to help convert the site into temporary accommodation.
Queensland Housing Minister Meaghan Scanlon called the decision “disappointing”, telling media the State Government had been trying to work with the federal government since 2023 to provide a proposal for the site, including a $10 million investment to convert the empty 500-bed facility into crisis accommodation.
An artist’s impression of the Centre for National Resilience at Pinkenba.
Premier Steven Miles, opposition leader David Crisafulli, and Labor councillor Jared Cassidy all shared a similar sentiment: the federal government’s decision was disappointing.
It’s necessary political posturing during a highly visible housing crisis. But their response, however well-meaning, is not reflective of the conversations I’ve had with service providers and those working closely with vulnerable communities.
There’s a perception in the wider community that any bed is better than none. That any offer of “shelter”, even if it’s a facility next to an airport in an industrial area, without amenities, support services and transport, should be gratefully accepted.
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But talk to people who work day in, day out to provide housing solutions, and you see how shortsighted it is.
“As it stands as a quarantine centre, and without knowing what work could be done, I didn’t see it as suitable,” Micah Projects chief executive Karyn Walsh says.
“What we really need is for people to get a place where they can have secure tenancy, we can’t just keep funding crisis accommodation.”
Walsh understands that other organisations have put forward proposals for Pinkenba, including peak housing provider Q Shelter. But for many reasons, including the facility’s design (the beds are in units without kitchens or laundries), uncertainty over costs, its distance from health services and lack of transport infrastructure, she found it unsuitable.
“My position was based on a visit to the site, how it stands and how far away it is. It needed intensive work to make it suitable,” Walsh says.
For some unhoused individuals, living in a tent close to essential services is safest in lieu of secure long-term housing. Credit: Tony Moore
To Schrinner’s moral outrage at those living in tents and cars around the inner city, Walsh offers a different perspective.
“We have to put ourselves in the position of people who are being moved around and dislocated all the time. The desire to have something that suits their needs, if it’s realistic, is something that we should respect. Don’t just say, ‘there’s a bed, go and sleep’,” she says.
There are equal concerns about the kind of environment Pinkenba would have created. “Whenever you’re bringing groups of people together, there’s a huge people management issue.
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“Not everybody can cope in a large environment. There would be people that couldn’t contemplate living with 500 people.”
For people experiencing complex trauma, addiction and health issues, a supportive housing model that provides services and secure tenancy like Common Ground in South Brisbane might be far more appropriate.
Could you imagine some of society’s most vulnerable trying to wade through the crowds at DFO to do groceries? Or finding the money and means to get to a bulk-billed hospital appointment in the inner city?
And then there’s the suggestion to use Pinkenba for women and children escaping domestic violence. Again, you have to wonder how much time politicians have actually spent with victim-survivors, hearing their stories, understanding their experiences and considering their needs.
From where I stood on the other side of that fence, it felt more appropriate to ship perpetrators of violence out to a noisy industrial area in accommodation surrounded by barbed wire with 500 strangers than those escaping violence.