Inequality in Australia: The Persistence of Policy Hopes and Failures

Abstract

This is the ninth State of Australian (now Australasian) Cities Conference, an event that has grown in in fl uence since it was instigated by urban scholar and advocate Pat Troy in 2003. Despite the honour of being asked to commemorate a great Australian, my given topic for the 2nd Patrick Troy Memorial Lecture was not a joyous gift to receive: (in)equality in our cities. Try a positive angle, or descend into dire statistics and iterations of failed attempts to correct inequality? The latter is depressing, but taking a lead from Pat Troy ’ s decades-long stance, one cannot swerve from the dismal numbers, situation and trajectory. He saw inequality, inequity and injustice as inarguably wrong. In some eyes that stance puts one on the left, but later I suggest that need not be so. But as Pat would always do, one must look to policy answers, and explore how these have not or could be implemented. After a brief, dismal iteration, I will re fl ect on why so many viable policy options to reduce inequality have not proceeded, drawing on a recent cross-policy sector analysis of the preconditions of Australian policy reform. That is a depressing perspective (reform is rare and hard) but also opti-mistic (reforms are possible).