By Afraa Kori
Single father Steve Whittington is overwhelmed by soaring interest rates, rising living costs, and stagnant wages — despite juggling three jobs and acknowledging his privilege in owning a home.
He attended the ABC’s Q&A segment held in Beaconhills College, where he raised a powerful question to the panel of politicians and experts.
In an exclusive interview with Gazette, he shared that “both major parties are offering short-term, band-aid solutions in a bid to win the election, and the next one. It’s ingrained and pathetic”.
A well-paid education union organiser by day, Steve has turned to casual delivery jobs by night, rented out his bedroom on Airbnb, and sold household items just to make ends meet. He’s skipped medical appointments, avoided prescription medicine he needs, paused private health cover, and is now considering dropping his home insurance — not by choice, but because he feels stuck
Steve can’t afford to fix his leaking gutter and balcony, despite the internal damage worsening. He hasn’t taken his kids on a holiday in three years — not even their usual budget camping trips with other families.
This has taken a serious toll on his mental health — he’s losing sleep, battling constant anxiety, skipping meals and feeling isolated.
“It has put significant strain on my relationship because my girlfriend feels obliged to pay for everything,” he said.
“I pretend that I’m not available to catch up with friends when in reality it’s because I’m ashamed that I can’t afford to.
“I skip meals, make my own take-away coffees and teas at home. Often, I will cook for my kids but not me, telling them I had a late lunch.
“I feel like the frog in water that’s slowly been brought to the boil – the gradual sacrifices over three years have culminated in me feeling like I don’t have a life.”
His fight to keep his home exposes a harsh truth — hard work is no longer enough as mortgage and rental stress bites deeper in Casey and Cardinia.
Since the last federal election, Steve’s mortgage repayments have increased by 16 per cent, his electricity bill by 12 per cent, council rates by 20 per cent, his grocery bill by 17 per cent, and private health cover by 32 per cent.
As a single parent, he’s also restricted in terms of earning capacity, but he knows many families where both parents are working, looking to take on more work, and still finding it tough to live as they would like to.
He has never felt this level of pressure before, recalling the stress of his first $250,000 mortgage in 2001, but now his mortgage is nearly three times that due to rising house values and a costly divorce in 2019.
Steve is close to a breaking point, having reached out to his bank for financial hardship assistance, only to discover they “do not offer much in the way of respite”.
Labor’s housing minister Clare O’Neil and Coalition’s Michael Sukkar admitted that they can’t fix every problem Steve has raised, however pitched how their party would help ease the burden.
Coalition’s Michael Sukkar argued that Australians are worse off under Labor, pointing to sharp declines in household income and living standards, which he attributed to excessive government spending driving up inflation and interest rates.
“There’s no doubt your (Steve) story — which you very eloquently put — is one that’s felt by lots and lots of people,” he said.
“We’ve seen the biggest drop in household income in a generation… and the biggest drop in living standards that we’ve seen in a generation in the last three years.”
“Since the election of the government, we’ve seen $425 billion of additional spending, which most economists would say has kept inflation higher for longer — and mortgage interest rates higher for longer.”
Ms O’Neil assured the audience that the Labor government has done everything within its power over the past three years to ease the pressure on households.
“We believe that people should get paid properly for the work that they do,” she said.
“We’ve just had five quarters of positive wages growth. That’s not an accident, it’s happened because our government’s done some really big things on this front.”
