When I moved back home to Adelaide a couple of years ago, I had a plan.
As a single mum, it would be much easier in Adelaide than in Melbourne for me to afford the rent on a home for my daughter and provide for us both. As she grew up I’d slowly build up my work hours.
By now, I thought I’d be past living paycheck to paycheck. I’d hoped my planning would set us up for the future.
But this winter, as my bills have roughly doubled, it’s become incredibly difficult just to get by on a regular income.
Winter was already rough, with illness knocking us both around and, as a freelancer, not having the security of sick pay. But the bills have really pushed me over the edge – paying my last gas bill pushed my bank account into overdrawn on more than one occasion.
And I know I’m not the only one. When I talk to other parents at school, or my colleagues, or my friends, everyone is trying to balance skyrocketing prices on everything from petrol to groceries.
A survey published by Australian Parents for Climate Action this week found that 95% of families had made changes at home like spending less on food, driving less and not using their heaters during winter. It also found that nearly 10% of households had taken on debt to deal with rising costs.
This report, coupled with my own experience, highlights just how far some people are falling behind.
Every time I see news stories about energy prices continuing to rise, or about insurance premiums and food prices rising with the risk of extreme weather, I feel quite anxious.
I worry about how I’m going to afford Christmas presents in a couple of months, or new school shoes in January, or next year’s winter heating bill.
And I feel frustrated because we have solutions that could help so many families like mine live a better life, if there had been better planning and foresight by our leaders.
As a renter, I have really limited options in the kinds of things I can do to keep my power bills down. I’ve recently had to wait on my landlord to arrange a tradie to come and fix some leaky tiles, where heat was escaping.
I hear the success stories of other parents who haven’t paid a power bill in years because of their solar panels, or those who save hundreds of dollars by driving an electric car instead of paying for petrol.
But for a lot of Australians like me, those options are out of reach and we’re left to pay the price for Australia’s reliance on fossil fuels.
Even if I had the money, I couldn’t install solar panels on my rented house, which would reduce my power bill, and I certainly couldn’t just switch our gas stove or heating system to electricity.
Like many Australians, I rely on my car for transport, and have also struggled with the cost of petrol going up. I work too far from home to cycle, and my daughter is still too little to ride her own bike to school.
And while I love the idea of those electric cargo bikes I see other families zipping around on, carrying their kids and groceries easily, there’s no way I could ever afford thousands of dollars to buy one, especially not with so many other cost pressures.
With a coordinated approach, Australian governments at all levels could provide incentives for landlords to make our homes more affordable to live in, by upgrading appliances and increasing minimum efficiency standards.
They could help lower-income families afford electric cars by introducing measures to encourage a second-hand EV market.
And by investing in clean energy to go into the power grid now, we know that energy prices will come down for everyone in the long run.
What’s more, making these changes will help reduce Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions, helping keep the environment safe and healthy for us and our children.
Our governments have largely failed to plan for us to be able to rely on clean and affordable energy. But now is the time for our leaders at all levels to step up and put in place good policies that support families now and well into the future to make clean and energy efficient decisions in our homes.
Liz Cahalan is an Adelaide mother-of-one and a member of Australian Parents for Climate Action.