Brisbane Common Ground Case for Change Paper
Brisbane Common Ground’s (BCG) provision of supportive housing delivers diverse benefits, from health of the individual to social cohesion. This report quantifies and explores these benefits, finding that improvements to an individual’s health, safety and social outcomes due to BCG generate $203,700 in economic and social benefits per tenant, over their lifetime.
Today, social housing is a critical social infrastructure within Australia – creating genuine impact on lives of many, every day. However, there remains a cohort of people for whom the typical constructs of social housing alone are not enough.
BCG provides a dedicated solution for those who have been systematically failed, are highly vulnerable, and have complex needs that our systems are not equipped for. With the goal to end homelessness one person a time with the community in which they operate, BCG provide subsidised housing and wrap-around services known as supportive housing.
The benefits of the BCG model cannot be understated – generating benefits across the system and individual tenants. Improvements to an individual’s health, safety and social cohesion outcomes due to BCG generates $203,700 in economic and social benefits per tenant, over their lifetime.
Further, BCG’s provision of supportive and permanent housing reduces the risk of return to homelessness for its tenants, resulting in a $455,800 fiscal benefit to Queensland over a ten-year period. The cost savings to government are based on a standard cohort of previously chronically homeless tenants and the reduced likelihood of that cohort's return to homeless, compared to social housing.
