The Greens have responded to the LNP Lord Mayor of Brisbane's announcement that the Council will be evicting homeless campers from parks.

The public housing waitlist in Queensland is over 47,000 people long, and just last year almost 25,000 people in Queensland who came to homelessness services looking for medium or long term accommodation were turned away without help. 

Every week in Queensland, homelessness services are being forced to close their doors during their regular operating hours to people coming desperately seeking help.

Lines from Max Chandler-Mather, Greens spokesperson for Housing and Homelessness & MP for Griffith:

"People are sleeping in parks because of chronic underfunding of housing and homelessness services that have seen tens of thousands of people denied long term housing and the support they need. Criminalising individual rough sleepers is not only cruel and hypocritical, but it won’t actually fix the problem."

"No one chooses to sleep rough in a park when they have better options. Hostels are not safe for people fleeing domestic violence or trying to stay sober. People with complex mental health issues dumped into a hotel with no support are not going to be off the streets for long."

"It’s completely untrue to say that every rough sleeper has been offered accommodation. We know for a fact, from chatting to services on the ground, that there are hundreds of people just in this part of Brisbane alone that have been denied the housing and support they need because there is simply not enough funding."

"If governments were serious about ending homelessness, they would adopt the Housing First model - which has virtually eliminated chronic homelessness in Finland - where rough sleepers are offered permanent housing with no strings attached and the wrap-around support services they need to stay there long-term."

"The two main reasons people end up homeless are because of rent increases and family and domestic violence, so the Mayor should explain why he thinks those people should be criminalised rather than given the long term housing and wrap-around services they are currently being denied."

Lines attributable to Cr Trina Massey, Councillor for Gabba Ward:

"Starving homelessness services and public housing of funding, then criminalising people sleeping rough during the middle of a housing crisis is cruel and hypocritical from the LNP."

"The Lord Mayor’s cruel and opportunistic stance, criminalising homelessness just days after vulnerable communities were exposed to severe weather, does nothing to support those facing domestic violence, substance abuse, or others falling through the cracks."

"If the Lord Mayor was actually compassionate and seriously wanted to end homelessness, he would have increased funding to front line Council services like the Homelessness Connect, Public Space Liaison Officers, Community Development teams, and the Brisbane Housing Company."