Regional areas will play a key part in Labor’s plan to build 800 thousand new homes over the next decade, but in many rural areas, critical infrastructure like water and sewerage, simply aren't available to support those developments. Now, developers are warning thousands of homes won't be built unless money is pumped in to help connect the regions to water.
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00:00When Lauren Palmer and her young family moved into a new home in the northeast Victorian
00:07town of Tangambalanga, the lack of water pressure became an instant problem.
00:13When the pressure's bad, so especially in summer, in that sort of evening time when
00:16everyone's getting tea ready, it's terrible.
00:19The expensive sprinkler system they had installed barely works.
00:23She's had to buy a new washing machine that runs on low water pressure.
00:28And the bath took so long to fill, they stopped using it.
00:32So we've given up on that entirely and the bath's now used as storage.
00:36Now the future of her new community is uncertain.
00:40Building in this Tangambalanga estate has come to the end of the road.
00:45This street should be leading to at least 200 new homes.
00:49But without the guarantee of adequate water and sewerage infrastructure, construction
00:54has quite literally come to a dead end.
00:57We could have substantially developed the balance of the estate over that period of
01:01time if we'd had the appropriate water infrastructure here.
01:05Water infrastructure issues are putting a halt on crucial housing developments across
01:10the region.
01:11A 10 minute drive away in Leneva, this paddock is ready to house 400 new homes.
01:17And developers say they could build thousands more.
01:20But those plans are on hold.
01:23We're ready to go here in terms of we've got an approved development plan.
01:28We don't have the pipes to connect to.
01:30The need for more pipes here has been known by council and state agencies for years.
01:36But the water corporations charged with providing them simply don't have the money to do so.
01:41I think we would say that there needs to be more funding for critical infrastructure,
01:46particularly for the next 10 years to cater for growth.
01:49These estates are a crucial part of the state government's target of building 800,000 homes
01:55in a decade.
01:56It approved an emergency increase in some water corporations' debt caps last year and
02:02says it remains on track to deliver its promise.
02:06This is work that will continue with the planning minister, with local councils and of course
02:10on the really important issues of essential infrastructure.
02:14But developers don't share in that confidence.
02:17The only way these problems can be resolved in any sort of reasonable time frame is for
02:22state government to step up and provide extra funding to enable the infrastructure to be developed.
02:29Lauren Palmer just wants to see her new neighbourhood grow.
02:33Until they can fix the water issue, I don't see it happening.