A state government has an obligation to do what is possible within the limits of state resources to help its people, to make the state an inclusive place where all have access to essential services and housing. South Australia saw this during the glamour years of Premier Don Dunstan when government had the energy and the optimistic determination to make this happen. It seemed possible for all of us, including poor people, to have a fair go. However, over the last few weeks, with the announcement of the funding restructure for homelessness services, this idea of a fair go seems to have dissipated.
Last month, Human Services Minister Michelle Lensink announced the defunding of three well recognised Adelaide institutions: Vinnies Night Shelter, Catherine House for Homeless Women and Hutt St Day Centre. Beginning 1 July, these three places serving homeless people within the Adelaide CBD would each have their funding cut by $1.2 million dollars each. In the case of Catherine House, this amounts to one third of their funding.
From 1978 to 1984, I was a Catholic chaplain to the SA Women’s Rehabilitation Centre, (now the Adelaide Women’s Prison). While post-prison housing was difficult to find for men at the time, it was non-existent for women. For that reason, Catherine House for homeless single women — begun by Sr Anne Gregory and the Sisters of Mercy in 1988 — was a godsend. Now, 33 years later, as the government champions various initiatives to challenge the horrors of domestic violence, this defunding of established service providers like Catherine House seems an astonishing contradiction.
The new funding model for services required existing providers to tender bids to be a part of five new ‘homelessness alliances’. These would cover Adelaide South, Adelaide North, Country South and Country North areas, with a separate alliance dedicated to domestic and family violence. Recognised service providers, including The Hutt St Centre and the St Vincent de Paul Society, both missed out on the tender for the Adelaide South alliance.
Of course, pitting organisations against each other for government funding has long been a practice in the area of Aboriginal affairs. 40 years ago, Kaurna Elder Lewis O’Brien, (now 91 years old) admonished my naïveté: ‘I don’t know why you’re getting so surprised — that’s what governments do. If you or your organisation is successful, then the funding is cut.’ In more recent times this practice of competition for funding seems to have become a worryingly prevalent practice with NGOs, including church-based organisations.
And it’s important to note that this competing for resources, and restructuring in general, has nothing to do with availability of funding. In announcing the changes, Lensink emphasised that in 2020-21, the amount of state funding committed to specialised homelessness services has increased to a total of $71.5 million, from $67.9 million the previous year. Yet it is simply no defense to proclaim that homelessness funding is more adequate now than ever before. Effectiveness is the genuine criteria. And under the new model, existing effective service providers will have their funding cut.
'Rather than the homelessness services sector being broken, I would argue, as others have said, that it is the housing sector that is broken, on a national scale and is in desperate need of new direction.'
In this funding restructure, it’s the failure to recognise the homeless community as people that is most worrisome. Previous long-term manager of Catherine House and Josephite nun Christine Schwerdt told me about a female resident who was grateful to be in a caring, safe, and accepting living environment in contrast to her previous life where, as she said, ‘there was never anyone to care for me.’ As Christine explains, it was often in the sharing of household tasks that women would open up about their lives and trust would grow to enable effective follow up services.
Once the funding for case management and follow up services have been stripped from established service providers and passed on to new ones, an important question remains: how will trust be re-established with clients who are coming in cold to the newly-funded providers? According to Chris Burns, CEO of Hutt St Centre, founded by the Daughters of Charity in 1954, the new funding model will put an end to his centre’s case management programs, breaking the ‘continuum of care.’
Similarly, speaking with the ABC, Hutt St Centre volunteer Colleen Draper explains her fears that under the new system, vulnerable people will become just a number. ‘These people who come here are somebody… you need a personable touch for vulnerable people.’
From 1 July, the state has made clear that the focus will be placed on homeless prevention, itself a positive thing. Lensink stressed the ‘Australian-first Alliance approach… places a strong focus on early intervention to prevent South Australians from becoming homeless in the first place.’ But this raises another question: How will the government’s new emphasis on preventing people from falling into homelessness help mitigate the suffering of people already dealing with it?
Others have voiced similar concerns. St Vincent de Paul Society SA CEO Louise Miller Frost told ABC, ‘We’re not sure where [other providers] are going to find 47 crisis accommodation beds for men anywhere really, let alone in the CBD in Adelaide in the middle of winter… I’m not sure where we’re supposed to send them on the first of July.’
In the background to all this, it might be worth noting that State Minister for Human Services Michelle Lensink’s wide portfolio includes housing. The South Australian Housing Trust, formed by the present state government’s predecessor in 1936, had the deserved reputation of being the best government housing in the nation, possibly the world. While South Australia still has one of the highest percentages of social housing in Australia, sadly in the last 20 years, over 20,000 publicly owned houses and units have been sold off, some to NGOs, but a great number to the private market. Rather than the homelessness services sector being broken, I would argue, as others have said, that it is the housing sector that is broken, on a national scale and is in desperate need of new direction.
Aboriginal people will be among those badly affected by these cuts to city homeless centres as well as cuts to Aboriginal Family Support Services. Respected Yankunytjatjara Elder, Waniwa Lucy Lester cut through the government’s rationale of this withdrawal of services to its poorest citizens, saying: ‘We know what government are doing. They don’t want to help our people.’
Michele Madigan is a Sister of St Joseph who has spent over 40 years working with Aboriginal people in remote areas of SA, in Adelaide and in country SA. Her work has included advocacy and support for senior Aboriginal women of Coober Pedy in their successful 1998-2004 campaign against the proposed national radioactive dump.
Main image: Woman experiencing homelessness on the street (Getty Images)