Getting people off the homeless merry-go-round
Blog entry August 2009
This month again finds an East Kent Homeless charity facing closure, due to what is perceived to be heavy handed inspection regimes and a reduction in funding streams. Of course the facts are somewhat different.
We, in this complex sector are responsible for giving our customers what they want, whether they are the people seeking help through our services or the bodies that fund us. The contract culture has indeed brought an increased bureaucracy and some would say, increased costs associated with administration, but it has also brought transparency, accountability, value for money and most important of all an insistence on quality.
The days are long gone when homeless people had to accept what was on offer and be grateful for it. We have and I would say always have had, both a moral and contractual duty to not only offer shelter but also real help with getting people off the homeless merry go-round.
Homeless organisations can no longer exist for the benefit of the homeless alone; we must also prove our worth to the communities in which we work, the authorities that fund us and the public who support us. It is not acceptable to maximise income to generate surpluses and not plough these back into services that is, after all, what being a registered charity is all about.
The personalisation agenda is also firmly upon us. We must embrace this idea of choice not just for the sake of it or because some may see this as a passing government fad, but simply because to give people real choice is empowering and empowered people can change their lives for the better so they are not continually reliant on the organisations providing so called ‘tailored’ services.
I only hope that the cuts in public expenditure do not undo what we have achieved and can achieve in future in relation to empowerment and choice for our most vulnerable customers.
