Former prime minister Tony Abbott has slammed the NSW government for refusing to clear a group of people who have set up camp in Sydney’s Martin Place.
Dozens are camping in front of the Reserve Bank of Australia, sparking a war of words over who should deal with them.
In an interview on 2GB on Wednesday, Mr Abbott urged NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian to “politely, but with great vigour” call on the police to clear the tents.
He said they were protesters and questioned whether they were needy.
"If you are genuinely homeless, there are services you can access, there are places you can go," Mr Abbott said.
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"This is a protest. That's all it is. It's a political protest and frankly a government that allows a political protest to disrupt people's daily lives ... is a government which has lost its nerve."
On Tuesday, Ms Berejiklian said homeless people sleeping rough in the city centre made her “completely uncomfortable.”
“I’m concerned that some [homeless] people there are not there for the right reasons and that’s why we’ve written to [Sydney Lord Mayor] Clover Moore asking her to do what’s in her powers to move them on,” she said.
But Ms Moore hit back, saying she had no power to remove them, and called on the state government to provide more affordable housing.
"It's not illegal for people to be homeless - for some people it's an inevitable consequence of the housing affordability crisis in Sydney," Moore said in a statement this week.
"We have the power to move structures and make places safe. But we don't have the power to move people on. The police have the power to do that. We're not calling on the police to do that. But that's the reality."
Ms Moore blamed the swelling numbers of homeless people on "decades of gutless inaction" on homelessness from successive state governments.
More than 400 people regularly sleep rough in central Sydney. While homelessness is a complex problem, experts have warned growing numbers of people are failing to benefit from the nation's stellar economy.
An unprecedented economic expansion - fuelled by a massive mining investment boom - has boosted house prices and lined the pockets of many citizens.
But it has also led to the country's biggest cities, Sydney and Melbourne, being ranked second and 10th on a list of the world's least affordable housing, putting further pressure on those already struggling.
