There are few more devastating choices than this: stay with a violent partner or become homeless.
And yet, every year, thousands of Australian women are forced to make that choice.
New data from Anglicare Australia’s Rental Affordability Snapshot shows just how few options are available for women trying to build a safe life on their own — particularly single mothers. For a single mum on Parenting Payment with two children, just 0.7 percent of rental listings were affordable across the entire country. That’s not a typo. Out of over 51,000 listings, just 352 met the affordability and suitability threshold. For single mothers with a child under five? Zero affordable homes.
Even those working full-time on minimum wage fare little better. A single mother with two children on minimum wage, or on a combination of Parenting Payment and work, could afford just 0.3 percent of listings. That’s 157 listings across the entire country.
These aren’t abstract statistics. They represent real women who are trying to leave dangerous situations. Real children who need a safe, stable place to call home. And behind these numbers is a tragedy that repeats itself year after year.
Each year in Australia, around 7,690 women return to violent partners because they have nowhere else to go. Another 9,120 women escaping violence become homeless, because there are no safe and affordable homes available to them.
This is the cost of our failure to invest in long-term social housing.
When we talk about domestic violence in Australia, we often focus on crisis support, frontline services, and justice responses — all of which are essential. But too often, the missing piece is housing. You cannot rebuild your life without a safe place to live. And right now, for far too many women, there’s nowhere to go.
The private rental market is simply not an option for most women escaping violence — especially if they are parenting alone or relying on income support. And as this year’s Snapshot shows, even full-time work isn’t enough to secure a home in most cases.
The solution goes far beyond the need for more shelters, temporary beds, or emergency options. These are critical to the short term, but they are not a long-term plan. Women deserve more than just a crisis response. They deserve a permanent, affordable home — a foundation to rebuild on.
That’s why Anglicare Australia is calling for a national commitment to build 25,000 social homes each year. Social housing isn’t just a roof over someone’s head. It’s the difference between safety and danger, between starting again or going back. It’s what allows single mothers to give their kids a future, women to live free from fear, and communities to heal.
We know that social housing works. We know it’s cost-effective. And we know that it’s overwhelmingly supported by the public — including the vast majority of women. What we don’t have is the political will.
Instead, the major housing announcements ahead of the federal election have offered more of the same: tax breaks for buyers, schemes for new home builds, and market-driven incentives that completely overlook women on low incomes and survivors of violence. These policies may help a few people get into the market — but they do nothing for the women who have already been pushed out.
Worse still, when affordable homes are not available, people question why women would “choose” to return to their abusers or why they would “fail” to plan their escape. But what does choice look like when the only options are violence or homelessness?
This is not a failure of individual decision-making. It’s a failure of policy — one that is putting lives at risk.
We cannot claim to take domestic violence seriously while continuing to ignore the housing crisis that underpins it. We cannot say we value women while denying them a place to live safely and with dignity. And we cannot break the cycle of violence unless we provide women and their children with the stable foundation they need to thrive. A safe, affordable home is not a luxury. It is a right — and it is the very least we owe to the women who are doing everything they can to protect themselves and their families.
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