The Renters

This genre-bashing documentary spends time with essential workers, artists, young families and students who all have one thing in common – they are not able to access what we’ve been told is the ‘Australian dream.’ They make up a third of households in Australian, are a growing cohort, and are a key to a sense of community. In its hybridized, comedy, style it follows the threads of their stories while simultaneously allowing our host, satirist and renter Mark Humphries, space to dive into the system that got Australia here.

We see people forced further from their places of work and study, we learn what rental insecurity looks like, what that means for renters wanting to act on climate change and live sustainably, and what alternative models of housing might look like. In the regions, we see what flood and fire have done to the ‘rental market’, or people. The series also features moments of uplift and joy, with both short and long-term solutions on the featured personal journeys.

This project is a conversation starter on the financial policies that drive housing and homelessness, on ‘liveable’ cities, on supporting the arts in our ‘global cities’, on democratic access to the things Australia needs to do to tackle climate change and the biodiversity crisis (solar panels, E-Vehicle charging points, thriving urban gardens), on raising happy kids, each issue is a potential impact theme. Housing ties in to all of this.

We aim to add to the debate slowly taking hold in 2023 – the pressure for legislative change at the state and federal issue for better renters rights, and ultimately, a slow shift in Australia towards reducing policies which favour home owners financially

Public Education Foundation, Nurses and Midwives Association, Tenants Union, Real Deal, Sizzling Cities are all supporters.

We aim to shake viewers across the board; this is not just a social justice issue for young people; the life of our communities are at stake.