Light & Life
SPOTLIGHT ON HOMELESSNESS
Itís NATIONAL HOMELESS PERSONS WEEK, and increasing in numbers on our streets are the ELDERLY.
TRANSCRIPT
PAT (client of Carpenter Court): When I first came here I was an alcoholic and I was nearly 20 stone. Theyíve helped me stop drinking and lose weight, so theyíre great.
HELEN: And how are you feeling after making all those changes?
PAT: Great, no hangovers. No hangovers!
HELEN: Big things are happening at Carpenter Court.
Itís National Homeless Persons Week in Australia right now,
And thatís putting a spotlight on some shameful statistics.
The last census of homeless people showed there are around 100,000 every night in Australia. And that count was done in 2006 ñ before the Global Financial Crisis hit. One group seen to be on the rise are the over 55s. As a Community Service Program Manager with The Salvation Armyís Aged Care Plus, I asked Nicola Rosenthal about the changes sheís seen when it comes to the elderly and homelessness.
NICOLA ROSENTHAL: Um, itís getting younger and younger. We used to see socially isolated people at risk in their 70s and 80s but now theyíre getting younger, so weíre seeing people who maybe live in boarding houses who are getting dementia or who have mental health problems, who are facing eviction because they arenít coping and the boarding houses donít have the services to support them. Or people living in private rental who can no longer pay their rent because theyíre paying for pensions or food or trying to run a vehicle.
HELEN: Are there particular social issues you think are fuelling this situation?
NICOLA: Price of living, fuel, pension rates not keeping pace with the cost of living, and the difficulties in gaining private rental and keeping private rental and department of housing availability.
HELEN: Where do you see we need to start to work, to turn this situation around?
NICOLA: Iíd love to know the answer to that, I just donít know. I think if we had some more appropriate housing, supported housing, for older people and support for them living in that housing. And people who actually want to be living in, you know, accommodation that suits their needs, where their community is. Sometimes people are offered a house where their community is not, so they donít have friends or family nearby and thatís a real difficulty.
HELEN: What are the factors in elderly peopleís lives that are contributing to them ending up on the street, do you see common themes?
NICOLA: I think sometimes thereís family breakdown, families far away, weíre getting more scattered, the nuclear family is not what it was. But also people who have mental health problems, might have substance abuse issues, or people who just prefer to live a more isolated existence and donít have those supports around them.
HELEN: Fighting against the increase in elderly homelessness is the team at the Carpenter Court Social Isolation Project. Itís a pilot project, set up last year with some funding from the Department of Health and Ageing. The location is breathtaking ñ right on the beach in Newcastle.
NICOLA: Itís absolutely beautiful! Weíre looking straight over at the sea, with the beach right opposite out lovely building here at Carpenter Court.
HELEN: How do you manage to get any work done?
NICOLA: I overlook the carpark in my office!
HELEN:What does the program involve, what would you work through with a client?
TRACEY: A person coming through the program, for example, weíve got a lady here that is needing housing, she needed to be stabilized on her medication, she needed a full set of assessments completed, so once weíve got a fairly good idea of what her medical status is, what her social status is, and her mental capacity and her capacity to then go back out into the community, we broker her out with Community Options, who will look after or seek appropriate housing for her.
We also provide from the facility, weíll provide a buddy, a staff member here who will follow them through from their stay here out into the community. Theyíll check on the out in the community, theyíll go in one or two times a day, make sure theyíre taking their medications, make sure that the house is clean and theyíve got food in the cupboards and things like that.
HELEN: In the face of alarming statistics about elderly people and homelessness in Australia,
The Carpenter Court Social Isolation Project is working, case by case,
to help people get stabilized and supported so they can live safely in the community. Their application is in to extend the program and,
As Nicola Rosenthal explains, the feedback is looking promising.
NICOLA: The feedback that weíve gotten from the Aged Care Assessment Team at the hospitals here in the Hunter and from Community Options and other service providers in the area, is that this is a program that could really work because itís using residential aged care, community care, with community options, and health as a partnership so itís a really unique model and Tracey and the staff have worked really hard to make that happen for some quite difficult people that weíve had through the project.
HELEN: Is there some way you want to mark National Homeless Persons Week? Someone you can visit, somewhere you can volunteer?
If you need a place to start, thereís always salvos.org.au.