The NT Country Liberal Party government launched its NT Housing Strategy 2026-2030 on August 4.
In his foreword, housing minister Steve Edgington said that “housing is not just a social issue — it is essential economic infrastructure”. He also said the government wants to “support stable market conditions to encourage ongoing private investment in rental housing”.
The CLP’s strategy aims to “support investor confidence”. It includes the ominous commitment to “reduce the density of social housing in high-risk areas”.
The NT wait list for social housing in its urban centres ranges from six to 10 years long; more than 2000 people are on the wait list.
Yet the government’s housing strategy makes no quantitative commitment in the short to medium term (2026-2029) to construct new social housing dwellings.
In the long term, from 2030 onwards, it lists “increased delivery of mid-density public housing” as a measure of success, but does not say how many additional dwellings it envisages.
The government’s approach to social housing appears to be punitive, with “stronger tenant accountability”. It has adopted a policy to fast track evictions for social housing tenants who fall behind on their rent, yet provides no support for renters.
While it acknowledges that average house rents in Darwin grew by 13.8% in the year to December 2025 and that “key workers” also rent, its focus is to boost construction and supply.
Suki Dorras-Walker, a spokesperson for the NT Greens, told Green Left: “This strategy, unsurprisingly, does absolutely nothing to tackle the rental and social housing crisis in the NT. The NT has some of the worst protections for renters in Australia. There is nothing in the CLP’s plan to address no fault evictions, six-monthly rental increases or the lack of minimum rental standards.
“The social housing wait list must be brought down to zero, and there needs to be a rent freeze now to ease cost-of-living pressures.”
Even the NT government admits the territory has the highest homelessness rate in the country. Yet it is under funding, or closing, crisis and short-stay accommodation services.
In July, it confirmed that the YiSSA short-stay accommodation service in Darwin would close within 90 days, meaning that 383 people, including 145 children, will be evicted.
The CLP has refused to purchase the property at market rate and secure the future of the accommodation service. The landlord sought between $8-12 million, which the Minister for Children and Families described as “extortion”.
The CLP in May committed record sums to policing and prisons as part of its law-and-order budget over 2026-2027, which included $426.3 million to “construct, expand and upgrade police and correctional facilities”.
“There’s always money to build more prisons, but apparently never enough to secure people’s basic housing needs”, said Dorras-Walker.