Homelessness: A Lot Closer To Home Than You Think
When you walk down Queen Street in Auckland, or a main street in most cities, it is hard not to be overwhelmed by the amount of people sitting on the street. Whether you feel a desire to help them or a discomfort when you see them, homelessness is a growing problem in New Zealand. In 2001, a University of Otago study reported there were 28,917 house-deprived individuals in New Zealand, whereas now, there are approximately 34,000. That is about one in every 120 New Zealanders. Whether it is sleeping on the couch of a friend, making a home under a bridge or sleeping rough on a park bench, these people do not have a place to call home.
There are a multitude of reasons as to why people are homeless; from unaffordable housing, mental illness and poverty, to domestic violence, addictions and unexpected life events. In New Zealand, homelessness is defined as not having a long term, safe and secure accommodation. This does not just mean living without shelter on the street. In fact, it is estimated that 10% of the homeless in New Zealand are severely housing deprived. A majority of homeless individuals are referred to as the ‘hidden homeless’, these are the people that live in cars, on friends’ couches or in transitory homes.
The cost of homelessness is not cheap. While no formal cost-benefit analysis of homelessness has been conducted in New Zealand, the Committee for Auckland estimated that in 2010, providing income support, health and detention services to Auckland’s chronically homeless population cost an excess of $75 million in the last decade.
Breaking the Stereotypes
[shortcode id=”33529″]
One of the biggest problems surrounding the issue of homelessness is that of stereotypes. Those that are most aware of the stereotypes that homeless people find themselves laden with are the individuals who work with the homeless. The House Manager at Wellington Homeless Women’s Trust Helen Wilson has been with the organisation since it opened in mid 2013. During her years she has seen the stereotypes and had even been known to believing them herself. “Before I started this job I was like every other person in society who thought I was going to work with so called ‘bag ladies’ and I really did wonder what I was getting myself in for.” However, she admits that it became quite clear to her that “this in fact was just a perception that most people in society have and it truly was a myth.”
As someone on the forefront of reducing homelessness, Helen has interacted with a fair amount of homeless people and shared a tale about an unexpected homeless woman that shatters stereotypes. “We had a woman who worked for a government department that had been living in a bus shelter for three days before she came to live in our organisation. She was going to work as usual and her colleagues were not aware of her situation… You can never tell who is homeless. They may be the person you least expect, the person next to you at work, the person you sit next to on the bus or the person who waves and smiles at you in the street.”