In 2014 Homelessness Australia carried out qualitative research among its member organisations to elicit information that could inform the Australian Government and the Department of Social Services (DSS) on ways in which the effectiveness of its homelessness and housing spending could be better measured.

This paper considers accountability mechanisms in existing Council of Australian Governments (COAG) agreements on affordable housing and homelessness. It makes recommendations for improving those mechanisms' ability to deliver better outcomes for people who are experiencing homelessness (including those living in severely crowded housing) and for those at risk of homelessness.

Since the present measures of the effectiveness of that spending are contained in COAG's National Agreement on Affordable Housing (NAHA) and National Partnership Agreement on Homelessness, the paper is structures around those instruments.

The paper makes thirteen recommendations that focus on four areas; clarifying objectives, outcomes and indicators; transparency and stakeholder engagement; results-driven accountability - directing funding towards the achievement of outcomes, objectives and indicators; and data collection, collation and analysis.