Queensland's social housing crisis deepens as audit finds department failed to act

Vulnerable Queenslanders could be waiting even longer for social housing after the state's housing department dropped the ball on fixing its own problems.

A new report from the Queensland Audit Office found the department had only fully implemented four of the eight recommendations from a 2023 audit. That earlier report flagged that the department wasn't managing the social housing register properly and wasn't building enough homes.

According to Auditor-General Rachel Vagg, the department had only partially taken steps to confirm applicants were still eligible, consistently reviewed applications, and performed pre-allocation checks. They were also still not applying a consistent approach to priority allocation.

“While the department assessed it had fully implemented all our recommendations, we found that gaps remain for four of the eight recommendations,” Vagg said. “The department has taken steps to increase housing supply and improve its management of social housing. However, in an environment of increasing demand, the social housing register will continue to grow, and the department will increasingly find it challenging to effectively service those in need.”

The numbers paint a grim picture. At the end of last year, there were 32,848 applicants for social housing in Queensland. More than half were either homeless or at risk of homelessness. The average wait time? A brutal 28 months.

The department admitted that reduced staffing had contributed to the jump in applications. By March this year, the waitlist had dropped to 26,500 — but the audit found the department had actually gone backwards on reviewing priority allocations. A whopping 66 per cent were overdue for review, and 11 per cent were overdue by more than a year.

Between June and December 2025, the number of applications deemed priority allocations on the register plummeted from 2,160 to just 150 — a 93 per cent drop. The auditor-general said that was because the department had finally started reviewing existing priority allocations and found many were no longer eligible.

The audit made five new recommendations, which the department has agreed to. These include strengthening internal performance testing, changing how it manages applicants in transitional housing, tightening oversight of community housing providers, altering its approach when existing tenants' housing needs change, and updating its demand modelling.

Housing Minister Sam O'Connor pointed to the waitlist dropping by roughly 5,000 people as a sign the department was heading in the right direction. But he also acknowledged the scale of the problem.

“There is significant work to do following a decade where social housing delivery did not keep pace with our state’s growth,” O'Connor said. “With net growth of just 509 social homes on average per year between 2015-16 to 2023-24.”

This week, the government announced it would invest an extra $100 million over the next four years in the state budget, aiming to build 2,000 new social and community homes each year. But with a register that's still bursting at the seams, critics say it's barely a drop in the bucket.

For the thousands of Queenslanders stuck on the waiting list, the message is clear: don't hold your breath.