At Housing Matters, we deliver free, quality and confidential advice around housing and homelessness. We believe that everyone has the right to a place that they’re happy to call home.
Over the last few years our clients have come to us with increasingly severe housing stress. Combined with the impact of overstretched public services, this resulted in our cases taking 30% longer to resolve than in previous years. In response, we expanded our outreach, launching in-person advice drop-ins at five community hubs across Bristol: Easton, Lockleaze, Shirehampton, Knowle West, and Barton Hill. The areas chosen for our drop-ins experience high levels of deprivation and have long lacked accessible housing advice. We partner with trusted, familiar community hubs to deliver support. This very generous award from Charles Plater has support this work, what we call ‘Working Upstream’. By meeting people where they are, we aim to catch housing problems upstream – before they escalate into crisis or homelessness.
Our hope is that being out in the community delivering advice gives us the opportunity to support people further upstream, when their problems are just beginning to emerge and therefor easier to solve and avoiding the stress and trauma associated with crisis and homelessness.
Since the launch of the project in the summer last year we’ve already been able to support over 300 people directly through our outreach work. 94% of clients said they would not have accessed housing advice if it hadn’t been brought into their local area – a staggeringly high number, but proof that this is vital work in action.
Faith’s Story
Faith’s story shows the power of early intervention through our Working Upstream project.
Faith, a single mother of two, was living in a private rented flat up eight flights of stairs, struggling with chronic back pain and limited mobility since the birth of her first child. Frequent flare-ups left her trapped at home, unable to take her children out or manage daily tasks without help. Her housing situation, compounded by harassment and anti-social behaviour in the building, was severely impacting her mental health. Private landlords repeatedly rejected her applications due to her being on Universal Credit, leaving her feeling isolated and desperate.
After attending one of our local community centre drop-in sessions, Faith found a listening ear and much needed advice. Recognising the severity of her situation and the need for more in-depth support, we took Faith on as a long-term client. We helped her gather key medical evidence from her Physio and Health Visitor and supported her to document the harassment she was facing. With all the evidence we had collected we presented a strong case to the council to prove the unsuitability of her housing. The council acknowledge that Faith needed rehousing, However, Faith was initially placed in Band 2 on the social housing register - high priority but still requiring a potentially years - long wait due to Bristol’s housing shortage.
We couldn’t accept this. Further advocacy and evidence gathering led to a reassessment, and Faith was moved to Band 1, the highest priority group. We also secured a backdate based on when she should have been placed into this group, reducing her waiting time by a further six months. Thanks to this advocacy and support, Faith and her children are now expected to be rehoused within the next few months.
A big thank you to the Charles Plater Trust for funding this new and impactful project.
