NT’s housing shame exposed
Filth, disease in temporary camps
BABIES, children and families living in utter poverty with filthy water, milk carton crates as beds and disease spreading like wildfire.
This is not some Third World country in Africa – it is in Australia and it is our national shame.
It is Minyerri, home to about 400 people living in the remote Northern Territory community.
What started out as a good news story to upgrade remote housing in Minyerri has become a lifethreatening disaster of critical proportions.
Pictures sent to the NT News by a whistleblower show the appalling Third World conditions the displaced residents of the Minyerri houses marked for upgrade have been forced to live in since being told to leave their homes several months ago.
The whistleblower describes the billabong camps these people are living in as a hell on earth where disease is rife and people’s lives are at risk.
“It is a scene of despair and hopelessness,” the whistleblower said.
“Children, some only infants, men, women and grandparents forced to live in filth and squalor beside a billabong simply because no one in government cared enough to think about the need for emergency accommodation when the people were forced from their homes.
“People started to move out of their homes in April. They were excited because people were coming to fix their houses.
“It’s now September, the wet season is coming and these people have been living out in the open with no proper drinking water or sanitation. They are eating and drinking contaminated food and water.
“There are about 15 billabong campsites with around five or so people living in each camp in conditions that no one should have to live in.
“All the children have been sick at some stage with dysentery and dehydration.
“The billabong itself is rancid. It is not a flowing billabong.
“It is littered with nappies, human feces, food scraps and other waste around it and that is the sole source of water down there.
“It’s a breeding ground for disease.”
The whistleblower said most people had skin sores, ringworm and boils and it was their understanding some babies had to be medivaced out with illnesses.
“The nursing staff out there are doing the best they can in a repeating cycle of illness,” the whistleblower said.
“This situation isn’t right. “Why the government did not think there would be a need for emergency accommodation when these people had to leave their houses is beyond belief.
“Where did they think they were going to go? It is an absolute disaster.”
NT Minister for Housing and Community Development Gerry McCarthy announced on August 30 “the Territory Labor Government is improving remote homes and the lives of Territorians living in the bush with the release of a tender to upgrade 22 remote houses in Minyerri”.
“Good housing is a right for all Territorians,” he said.
The whistleblower said the NT government’s mission to build better houses was “admirable”, but it had “completely added to the problem by forgetting about where these people would live once they were out of their homes”.