Housing activists and those advocating for the homeless say that councils’ should rethink deploying private security officers because the evidence shows they are inflaming the already difficult situation.
Kelly Whitworth from the Homeless Person’s Union (HPU) told Green Left Radio on 3CR on May 22 that the Community Safety Officers (CSOs) had attacked the homeless community by the City of Melbourne.
Whitworth said that CSOs had moved people who had been near buildings in the CBD and had confiscated their personal possessions.
Nick Reece, the City of Melbourne Lord Mayor, championed a $2 million plan to help “tackle crime” as part of his 2024 re-election campaign. He said this would be achieved by security guards patrolling the city’s streets.
In March last year, the City of Melbourne awarded the contract to Crownland Security, a private security firm whose employees accompany police officers in moving people on and confiscating their belongings.
Council rolled this back by October in favour of an in-house program employing 11 CSOs to “address safety concerns” and “act as a deterrent to anti-social and complex on-street behaviours”.
Whitworth said these CSOs attack homeless people in the CBD. She said the HPU has campaigning against the CSO program after a former officer, Joel Owen, was dismissed by City of Melbourne following his alleged physical attack on a person outside Flinders Street Station last December.
Owen admits to doing this, but said he did so to protect himself and his partner after failing to deescalate a situation.
Owen also said the CSO team had been directed by a senior council coordinator to “not be afraid to use force when issuing move on directions to individuals ... or people sleeping or sitting against building lines.” Owen said the directive, issued during a December briefing, had stoked tensions with homeless people which, in turn, had contributed to numerous violent confrontations.
There is no suggestion that Reece was aware of the directive.
Following Owen’s dismissal, morale among CSOs has reportedly crashed and public scrutiny of the CSO program has risen.
Still the City of Melbourne has announced its intention to expand the CSO program by doubling the team. The draft 2026-2027 budget allocates $1.7-3.75 million to the CSO program.
The turn to private security is not an isolated phenomenon.
The City of Maribyrnong council voted in February to extend the controversial program which allows private security guards to patrol Footscray’s CBD.
This contradicted the findings of an independent evaluation by Footscray Community Response, that argued the officers used intimidation and violence against homeless people.
The City of Maribyrnong has since announced it will adopt a “civic-led response”. However, this has translated into the doubling the number of Protective Services Officers (PSOs) at local train stations.
Members of Footscray Community Response have also witnessed Maribyrnong Council workers confiscating people’s personal belongings.
In May, the City of Port Phillip voted to amend local by-laws to allow council workers to confiscate a homeless person’s belongings, including bedding. This was done despite the council’s own survey of 708 residents, 76% of whom were against the proposed amendment.
“It should go without saying, especially in a cost-of-living crisis, that homelessness should not be seen as indicative of a person’s character, but rather of their material circumstances,” Jacob Andrewartha told Green Left. Andrewartha is running for the Socialist Alliance in Pascoe Vale.
“Such ‘public safety’ initiatives aim to feed the lie that being homeless is a threat to public safety, conveniently removing public scrutiny from the failures of various administrations to provide quality, secure and affordable housing.
“By ignoring the CSOs’ actions, the potential for violence to increase in Melbourne’s CBD and beyond is very real. Councils and the state government have to work together to find safe solutions for homeless people.”