Issue 01: Home is Where You Pay Rent
Kia ora to new and returning students,
Nau mai to the 2021 university year. Last week our glasses were fogged up as condensation rose like Jesus on the third day from under our face masks. Already we’ve had a reminder that our hands are not washed of COVID-19 (keep washing your hands) and that we should party like every gig could be the last for a long hot minute. But this is not 2020. We can be stoked that infrastructure like contact tracing and online learning is in place so we can handle ourselves with a bit more certainty, hiccups aside.
A lot of us are moving at the moment, and it’s hard. It’s as if we’re in a toxic relationship with the housing market. All take and no give, we’re told it’ll change, but are we just being gaslit? TradeMe listings are making rooms look like 5 times bigger, the mould airbrushed away.
For students, the housing crisis means finding a home is stressful. We’re juggling side jobs alongside study to pay rent and settling for damp, windowless rooms. It means we often sacrifice going out to a friend’s birthday dinner or topping up our phones regularly. It’s not that nothing is being done about this, it’s that not enough is being done.
StudyLink’s weekly living costs were upped a while back (and then rent rose to match). There was a freeze on rent increases last year under COVID measures, and legislation was passed that allows us to nail things to the wall. Those in halls did not have to keep paying during lockdown in the end. We’ve seen the introduction of healthy homes standards which has been a bit of an improvement. Although, there can be complications in accessing the report and getting changes made (how many emails will be sent before that leaky roof is fixed?)
We know from talking directly to you, university support staff, and trying to find adequate housing ourselves, that we need—and deserve—solutions. In this week's issue, Ronia Ibrahim investigates flat hunting via Facebook (page 16), and Maia Ingoe reports on the stitch up that new Weir House residents experienced when a wing of the building was deemed “structurally unsound” (page 11).
We all deserve somewhere safe to go home to, and to be able to pay rent. If you’re on your 30th flat viewing and haven’t secured a place before your first assignment is even due, hang in there. If you’re settling into your hall, don’t put sweet chilli sauce on every meal because you’ll hate it by week three, and rest in the comfort that you’re not paying electricity by usage.
Keep picking up a copy of Salient to compliment your morning coffee or can of V. Salient will be here for you every week to reflect student life in Pōneke, and to throw you some dusty horoscopes if you want to blame stuff on the stars. Salient is about being critical of the University, VUWSA, and the Government’s money moves that affect us.
It’s also about celebrating positive stuff, like dope local creatives. Despite the bad, Pōneke can be a pretty awesome place to be. We’re both out-of-towners who decided that this is a good place to call home, despite not always having a secure place to live.
The housing situation is just one of the things we’ll be regularly reporting on this year. We need to remember that change is possible. There are representatives, academics, and advocates working to improve the state of it. Your education can help you participate in discussion and change things, too.
Ngā manaakitanga,
Sally Ward (she/her) and Matthew Casey (he/him)
Salient Co-Editors