Calls for urgent intervention to help Victorian teachers find affordable housing

Cooper Scott decided to become a teacher when he was 15.

"I came to it pretty quickly," he said. "It just seemed like the perfect job for me."

Getting his first job this year — teaching Humanities at Pakenham Secondary College — was a dream come true.

"I love to make sure when people leave the classroom that they've left with something new," Mr Scott explained.

When he got the job, he started looking for a place to rent near the school with his partner, Ashlee — also a recent graduate.

But on her wage as an entry-level social worker, and Mr Scott's graduate teacher's salary of about $79,000 a year, their housing options were limited.

Commute leaves energy levels and fuel tank depleted

Mr Scott said the lack of housing in their price range saw them pushed further and further away from the school.

"We applied for tonnes of houses, and sometimes they look at two students, or they look at a graduate and they say, 'I don't think they'll be able to pay … things like the bond,''' he said. "We didn't have bond money lying around."

The couple were eventually successful in getting a lease on a two-bedroom unit in Drouin, West Gippsland — a nearly 100 kilometre round trip from where Mr Scott works.

He said the commute, on top of the demands of teaching, left him feeling depleted.

Mr Scott said the commute also put pressure on his budget.

"I'm a couple of days out of payday and it's like, 'Oh, God, how am I going to fill up the car?'"

Calls for urgent intervention to help education workers

Australia's housing crisis is an issue across the board, but there are calls for urgent intervention in housing, specifically for education workers.

Research commissioned by the Australian Education Union has found affordable housing is out of reach for the majority of Victorian teachers and education support staff.

The Housing Affordability and the Teacher Shortage Victorian report was compiled by the University of New South Wales (UNSW), Deakin University and the University of Sydney.

One of the lead researchers, Scott Eacott from UNSW's School of Education, said the report found almost 4,400 Victorian teaching positions were located where a teacher with a median-salaried partner could not afford to rent a three-bedroom property.

It found 43 per cent of teaching positions were in a local government area (LGA) where single graduate teachers could not afford even a one-bedroom rental.

"It's very difficult, if not impossible, without some type of intergenerational wealth or a well-off housemate, for a graduate teacher to be able to get that entry-level property," Professor Eacott said.

He said even teachers at the top of pay scale would struggle; for a family on a single teacher's income, 74 per cent of LGAs had a median house price that was seriously, severely or impossibly unaffordable.

"It came up at a number of workshops that we ran a couple of years ago with teachers and school leaders. And they said it was a major factor in how they were able to staff their schools," he said.

Melbourne most unaffordable for state's teachers

Professor Eacott said Melbourne was arguably the most unaffordable place for teachers in the state.

"The inner city is the most difficult to afford to be able to live close to and in many cases there's also the difficulties of commuting in a lot of these spaces," he said.

President of the Australian Education Union's Victorian branch, Justin Mullaly, said workers at inner-city schools often had the longest commutes.

"There are many teachers travelling in excess of an hour and longer each day from outer suburbs into inner-city Melbourne, because that's where the school is that they work, but they simply can't afford to live in a closer local government area," Mr Mullaly said.

"And that's the case whether they rent or whether they seek to buy."

Professor Eacott said teachers should not have to travel long distances to go to work.

While many teachers were reluctant to speak publicly on the issue, the ABC has spoken to teachers who work in inner-city suburbs such as Brunswick or Richmond and live in the outer east — around an hour's commute each way by car, and longer by public transport.

Long commutes exacerbate teacher shortage, says union boss

Mr Mullaly argued that long commutes had a negative impact on wellbeing and productivity and made teaching less attractive as a career.

The union wants urgent intervention in housing, specifically for teachers and education support workers.

It has called for initiatives such as a new housing division within the Department of Education, rental subsidies, stamp duty exemptions for homes close to workplaces, and increased wages.

"We want to attract the best people to become teachers. And part of that is making sure that our profession is one that people can reasonably get housing," Mr Mullaly said.

"It's unclear when it became OK that our profession was one where you couldn't reasonably afford to buy a house."

The research comes as the union negotiates a new enterprise agreement with the state government, with the current agreement set to expire at the end of this year.

Teachers are calling for a 35 per cent pay rise, and are considering industrial action early next school year if that and other demands are not met.

Higher wages not a cure-all

Professor Eacott warned that it will take more than higher wages to fix the housing problem.

"You can't pay-rise your way out of this issue," he said.

"We actually have to build the type of infrastructure so that we can make housing available to our teachers, as with other key workers, in the areas that they're needed most.

"And it's part of ensuring that the government, at whatever level … can actually deliver on their legislative requirement for high-quality education for all children and young people throughout a state."

In a statement, a Victorian government spokesperson told the ABC "good faith negotiations for a new enterprise agreement are ongoing — and we look forward to an agreement being finalised".

It said $158.7 million was allocated in the latest budget to attract and retain teachers.

The spokesperson also said the government had a portfolio of more than 200 homes available to teachers at reduced rent at more than 60 remote or hard to staff schools.

The union wants more.

"The government has a very clear responsibility when it comes to the provision of education for children and young people, that they should be able to attend their local government school," Mr Mullally said.

"Even today, there was close to 2,000 vacancies being advertised in our schools.

"That means we can't be sure that we're able to deliver our curriculum programme to our students in every classroom with a permanent, qualified teacher. That's alarming."

Professor Eacott said housing would become more of an issue as older teachers leave the workforce.

"As teachers begin to retire, where do we actually start to get these new graduates and lower pay teachers actually into these areas?" he said.

"This is a potential issue that is going to hit very suddenly and very acutely with teachers not being able to afford and to work in some of the areas where there is the greatest demand."

Teacher hopes his passion doesn't rule out other life goals

For Mr Scott, being a teacher is more than a job.

But he hopes it does not put his other goals, like buying a house and having a family, out of reach.

"I see it as something that I really want to be doing for nearly my entire life. I found my passion … and that's what's keeping me going."

Additional data reporting by Madi Chwasta.