NEWS: MoU signed showing housing is a critical health priority

Menzies School of Health Research (Menzies) and Aboriginal Housing Northern Territory (AHNT) have signed an MoU.

The MoU formalises a collaborative partnership to improve the quality of remote Aboriginal housing in the NT.

AHNT Image – Liam Grealy (Menzies) and Skye Thompson (AHNT)

This comes at a critical time, with the federal and Northern Territory governments recently commencing a ten-year remote housing funding package for the Northern Territory. AHNT is the community-controlled peak body for Aboriginal housing in the NT, and as a part of the new 10-year, $4 Billion funding package, will play a key role in modelling how community control would work.

This MoU also recognises the ongoing success of collaborations between the two organisations. Menzies has engaged AHNT as a member of Expert Advisory Groups to inform work on monitoring and evaluation projects for the Healthy Homes program and the Homelands Housing and Infrastructure Program. Additionally, AHNT has independently commissioned research from Menzies to investigate options for Aboriginal-controlled governance of the remote housing system.

This partnership also provides the opportunity to expand remote housing research, helping to grow the capacity of Northern Territory-based researchers to support progress on remote housing through on-the-ground research.

Some recent instrumental research produced by Menzies and Liam Grealy as project manager, in this space, was the independent evaluation of the NT Governments ‘Healthy Homes’ program, ‘Healthy Homes Monitoring and Evaluation Project’.

Read more about the MoU media release here. 

Healthabitat congratulates the formal MoU and commends both AHNT and Menzies on their tireless, impactful and crucial work in this space.