Dr Liz Allen says,“we live where we can afford,balanced against our lifestyle desires,so it’s not surprising that we see disadvantage or advantage cluster.”Credit:Alex Ellinghausen
Many politicians and policymakers tend to be “lucky Australians”,without lived experience of disadvantage,Dr Allen said.
“Australia needs more people with lived experience of disadvantage in positions of leadership and power to undo the entrenched mechanics driving inequality in Australia,” she said.
Awais Piracha,associate professor of urban planning at the University of Western Sydney.Credit:
Last year,the top 20 per cent of Australian households earned,on average, six times more than the bottom 20 per cent.
Western Sydney University associate professor Awais Piracha,whose research focuses on disadvantage and discrimination in urban and transport planning,said the report is “spot on” about unequal access to opportunity.
“Sydney can be divided by any factor or variable you could imagine[but it is true] a complete and utter divide is[also] growing with culture,religion and politics,” Dr Piracha said.
“There are other factors that determine access and wealth including political and administrative power as well as natural factors such as urban heat islands and canopy cover,which are increasingly important. And all these things are better in advantaged areas.”
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Poorer communities in outer and hotter areas were increasingly suffering from “overdevelopment” while affluent communities had the ability,influence,connections and power to avoid it,Dr Piracha added.
Recent policy and infrastructure measures,includingSydney’s ‘Metropolis of Three Cities’ and millions committed to western Sydney projects will help shift some of each city’s geographic disparities,but more needs to be done,Mr Palmen said.