One of Sydney’s leading providers of crisis accommodation services is having to turn away hundreds of homeless women each year as the city struggles to cope with growing numbers of women needing help and a serious bed shortage for this client group.

In the past 12 months, Mission Australia’s 23-bed Kings Cross crisis accommodation service for women, A Woman’s Place, has provided accommodation for around 600 homeless clients but has had to turn away more than 1,000 because of a lack of beds and resources.

The experience of A Woman’s Place is being mirrored at other women’s crisis accommodation services across Sydney. As the number of homeless women has increased, the problem has been exacerbated by a lack of beds.

At present, there are only an estimated 150 crisis accommodation beds for homeless single women in the Greater Sydney metropolitan area – including none west of Parramatta.

According to Mission Australia’s spokesperson, Anne Hampshire, homeless men in Sydney have access to a larger range of services and a city-wide pool of crisis accommodation, but unfortunately, women have been overlooked.

“There are not enough services for women, particularly single women who are without partners or children. This is despite the fact that 42 per cent of the country’s homeless population are women,” Ms Hampshire said.

“The increase in the number of homeless women coming to our services is because of several reasons – women are now less likely to stay in domestic violence situations and are more comfortable asking for help.

“There are a lot of women coming to Sydney from rural areas and other states in search of job opportunities, but when the job doesn’t happen, there’s sometimes nowhere else to go but to us.

“The rapid gentrification of the city has also added to the problem. Boarding houses that once provided cheap accommodation for low income earners have been sold off over the years to make way for expensive new developments or converted into tourist accommodation.
“There were an estimated 1200 boarding houses in Sydney’s inner city back in 2003-2004, there are now under 300. The chronic lack of affordable housing in Sydney has forced many women, and men, onto the streets.

“Mission Australia isn’t suggesting taking beds away from men’s services, but increasing women’s beds across the city. We’d encourage governments, community agencies and businesses to consider what role they can each play in addressing this problem,” said Ms Hampshire.

Media contact: Ms Anh Dang (02) 9641 5031 or 0423 028 654