Frederick Oswald Barnett

Frederick Oswald Barnett (1883–1972) was an Australian social reformer. He was responsible for raising public awareness of inner-city poverty and leading the campaign for improved housing conditions.

Born on 28 September 1883 in Brunswick a suburb of Melbourne in Victoria, Australia, Barnett was the son of working class parents. He attended the Albert Street Primary School until 1898 when he joined the Education Department, initially as monitor, and eventually as student-teacher. He resigned in 1902, to become a clerk in the civil service. By 1920 he had qualified as a public accountant and established his own practice.

On 6 January 1909 he married Elizabeth Hyett, with whom he was to have four daughters and a son.

Throughout his life, Barnett was influenced by the Christian socialist tradition of the Methodist Church. In 1923, shocked after a visit to a slum mission, he joined with a group of other young Methodists which resulted in the foundation of the Methodist Babies Home in South Yarra in 1929. In 1928 he had graduated a Bachelor of Commerce from Melbourne University; in 1931 he completed a master's degree with the thesis “The Economics of the Slums” in which he correlated the physical condition of housing with the social condition of its residents. In 1934 he formed a study group of about 40 members comprising the lawyer Oswald Burt, several notable architects and a surveyor/town planner, Fr Tucker of the Brotherhood of St Lawrence and representatives of other church and charitable institutions. The group held weekly meetings to receive and discuss papers about housing reform and soon attracted the attention of the major evening newspaper, The Herald.

In 1935, a new government was elected, led by Albert Dunstan of the Country Party, with the support of the Australian Labor Party. Heavily influenced by Barnett’s study group, the new government appointed a Slum Abolition Committee (SAC). At the same time, Barnett and his group formed their own Housing Reform Council, which went on to become the Slum Abolition and Better Housing League. In 1936 the SAC became the Housing Investigation and Slum Abolition Board (HISAB); Barnett was its Deputy Chairman and other members of his group, including Burt, were prominent on it. The Board initially embarked on two initiatives: Firstly, to conduct a survey of housing within a five-mile radius of the GPO and secondly to make recommendations to the government on rehousing persons displaced by slum reclamation schemes. In the course of the survey, Barnett came to the realisation that slums were a result of poverty, rather than social condition and that such people would not be suitable for a house purchase scheme, but rather should be given rented accommodation at subsidized rates. In 1937 the board reported to the government; amongst other things, the report contained a list of slum landlords, causing a storm of protest. The report was subsequently criticized for concentrating on housing conditions, rather than issues of poverty, housing shortage and excessively high rents. Nevertheless, the government was pressured into passing the Housing Act of 1937 which enabled the constitution of the Housing Commission of Victoria (HCV).

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