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“This is a live and critical issue now and the longer we wait, the worse the situation will become.”
Amanda Bilson said she is grateful to have been provided with affordable housing and is sharing her story to help promote the need for social housing.Credit:Rhett Wyman
When the Bilsons first married in the 1980s, they bought a terrace in Surry Hills. They were forced to sell when interest rates hit 17 per cent in 1990, before the decades-long property boom, and rented ever since. Bilson said she wished in retrospect they had bought another home, but it was not a priority at the time.
Bilson took a career break when the children were young but spent most of her working life as a book editor, while Tony made his mark on the Sydney restaurant scene.
They met at Kinsela’s, which Tony opened with backing from Leon Fink, after having already established himself as a chef to watch in the 1970s with his former partner Gay.
During his life with Amanda, his many restaurants included the three-hatted Bilson’s at Circular Quay, Treasury at the Intercontinental, and Ampersand at Cockle Bay Wharf.
But in 2011, he was faced with an unexpected bill and his restaurant empire went into liquidation. Soon after that, for unrelated reasons, the Bilsons’ landlord decided to sell their home of 17 years.
Restaurateur Tony Bilson training young people at Treasury restaurant in 1993.Credit:Amanda Watkins
Bilson said she is forever grateful the couple were offered a flat above their friend’s fish and chip restaurant in La Perouse for a year. They then moved to Kogarah and their son, in his early 20s, lived with them to help pay the rent of $500 a week.
When Tony, by then in his 60s, was diagnosed with cancer, they were no longer able to afford the rent. The Bilsons were fortunate that community housing provider City West Housing had completed new buildings in Zetland and allocated them an affordable housing flat.
Zetland was a lot closer to St Vincent’s Hospital where Tony had his cancer treatment, as well as their friends in the eastern suburbs. The apartment is light and airy and filled with artworks collected during her life with Tony.
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Bilson said she was “a bit of a wreck” when Tony died, but she has found inner strength she did not know she had and surprised herself with her ability to make the most of her situation.
She now lives without financial stress, able to meet her rent and other commitments, from her pension and part-time editing work, but admits that “living with Tony, there was always financial stress”.
Bilson said Tony could be “very extravagant” but mostly any money he made from restaurants was ploughed back into the next business idea.
“Tony was a genius in the kitchen but he wasn’t really a genius at running a business,” Bilson said.
I don’t want to make too much of that … I always thought of him as an artist in the kitchen and saucepans were his palate, and there’s no reason why somebody who is a creative genius would be a good business person too.”
NSW Minister for Families and Communities Natasha Maclaren-Jones said the Coalition had reduced the waiting list for social housing from 83,000 under the former Labor government in 2010.
Social and affordable housing in NSW
- As of June 2021, there were 153,515 social housing homes for low earners with housing needs and 49,928 on the waiting list.
- Social housing includes public housing provided directly by the government, and homes managed by community housing providers.
- Across the state, there are also 13,500 homes designated as affordable housing where the rent is discounted to 30 per cent of the household budget for low and middle-income earners. There is no central waiting list.
- About 3000 affordable homes provided by private investors could be lost as the National Rental Affordability Scheme is phased out.
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