YOUTH HOMELESSNESS SERVICES COME TOGETHER FOR NAIDOC BREAKFAST

Margaret Tucker Hostel and Hope Street Youth and Family Services will celebrate NAIDOC week with a signature breakfast together as they join forces to address youth homelessness in Melbourne's northern growth corridor. A Memorandum of Understanding has been developed between the organisations to enhance service delivery and improve outcomes for young people and their children at risk of or experiencing homelessness.

Margaret Tucker Hostel is the statewide service for Aboriginal young women and their children while Hope Street, has multiple operations sites in Melbourne’s Northeast and Northwest providing nation leading responses to youth and child homelessness. In Australia and Victoria, the largest population of people experiencing homelessness are young people under 25 and their children. As frontline youth homelessness services, Hope Street and Margaret Tucker Hostel deliver vital support and accommodation to meet the needs of the community, making this a valuable partnership.

“To be a responsive youth homelessness provider, Hope Street needs to work with partners to achieve the best outcomes for young people. This partnership with Margaret Tucker Hostel will support safe options for Aboriginal people which will promote connectedness to community.” - Sue Scott, Hope Street Operations Manager.

This NAIDOC Week breakfast is an opportunity to showcase to the community the importance of collaboration and walking together in reconciliation now more than ever. This year to celebrate NAIDOC's theme of “Keep the Fire Burning,” Blak, Loud and Proud; both organisations have built on their long-term relationship by developing an MOU, a feature of Hope Street's Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP). Standing together to deliver safe and secure housing and holistic support for young people experiencing homelessness.

“I have worked at Margaret Tucker Hostel since 2012 providing much needed support to the most vulnerable members of the Aboriginal community who are homeless or at risk of homelessness. The hostel provides supported crisis accommodation to young Aboriginal women and their children who are aged from 15-18 years of age. Margaret Tucker Hostel supported over 20 young women and children in the last year. This partnership with Hope Street will enhance service delivery for young people and the local community.” - Worrell Blow, Manager at Margaret Tucker Hostel.

This community partnership will enable Hope Street to strengthen cultural safety across their services for First Nations young people and their children. This partnership allows Margaret Tucker Hostel’s staff to have access to Hope Street’s nation leading facilities and resources that provide wrap around support in a therapeutically designed accommodation for young people and young families.

The NAIDOC Breakfast will be held from 7.30am Wednesday July 10th at the Margaret Tucker Hostel

Margaret Tucker Hostel morning tea and tour of Melton for Reconciliation Week.  

This week is Reconciliation Week 2024! Hope Street welcomed Worrell Blow, Manager from the Margaret Tucker Hostel for a Morning Tea and tour at the Melton First Response Youth Service Refuge on Wurundjeri country.

Worrell is a Yorta Yorta/Goreng Goreng woman from Victoria and has worked at the hostel since 2012. Worrell shared some of the history of Aboriginal community services in Melbourne for the team to learn about this significant work being done for and by mob.  Worrell also shared the history of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who established the Margaret Tucker Hostel. 

Margaret Tucker Hostel provides supported crisis accommodation services and support to young Aboriginal women and children aged 15-18 years who are experiencing homelessness or at risk of homelessness. The hostel was named after Aunty Margaret Tucker MBE who was a survivor of the Stolen Generation and respected leader and activist for Aboriginal rights.

As a purpose-built facility for young people and young families experiencing homelessness, the Melton First Response Youth Service Refuge showcases through this collaboration, elements of design that Margaret Tucker Hostel may consider in re-building for their Hostel as a purpose designed centre for their young women.

This event was attended by Hope Street staff from all five sites to hear Worrell’s insights and sharing of information that led to the development of Aboriginal specific services.  The significance and importance of Aboriginal established, governed, managed and operated services was acknowledged by all.  Hope Street and Margaret Tucker Hostel are keen to develop shared learnings and have recently signed a MOU outlining key activities to achieve together for the benefit of young people, their children and the teams with both agencies.  

Hope Street and the Margaret Tucker Hostel are committed to supporting each other’s work in youth homelessness in a collaborative environment connected to country and community.  Central to the relationship is the spirit of the theme: Now More Than Ever.

Both Worrell Blow and Donna Bennett confirmed their commitment to Hope Street and Margaret Tucker Hostel embarking on this journey of walking together in reconciliation.

OZ Harvest and StreetSmart’s Sleep Safe  

Community partnerships help young people and young families experiencing homelessness.  

Thank you, Oz Harvest, and StreetSmart for the on-going community partnership with Hope Street to provide essential items to young people and young families experiencing homelessness. Food and a safe place to sleep are essential for dignity and wellbeing.  

Hope Street is currently engaging with long term partner StreetSmart through its partnership with Sheridan which creates Sleep Kits for people who are at risk of or experiencing homelessness. These kits have been delivered to different Hope Street youth housing programs as a practical way to support young people and young families.  Each kit contains a towel, fitted sheet, flat sheet and pillowcase and provides quality comfort to young people and young families as they are supported at Hope Street.  These Sleep Safe Kits give comfort, dignity, and practical support to vulnerable people in their time of crisis.   

In addition to the Sleep Kits, Oz Harvest through their initiatives for food wastage reduction deliver meals to Hope Street to keep the fridges and pantries full of the 7 young people and families in the supported youth housing Foyer-like program in Thomastown.   A welcome relief to young people who otherwise would not be eating three meals a day due to the cost of living.   

Oz Harvest has become a leading food rescue organisation on a mission to ‘Nourish our Country’ by stopping good food from going to waste and delivering it to charities that help feed people in need. Such successful programs ensure that food waste is reduced, whilst quality food is still able to be consumed in the local community. OZ Harvest make regular deliveries to Hope Street as part of their cause and the impact this has on young people being able to sustain their housing (rent) and independent living which means they are less likely to re-enter into rough sleeping due to cost of living forcing them out of tenancies.    

Thank you, Oz Harvest, and StreetSmart for your incredible mission and gift that goes a long way in enabling young people to sustain independent living!  

Hope Street welcomes budget announcements for homelessness as part of the Home Time campaign.

Win for children and young people in budget announcement!

Hope Street Youth and Family Services welcomes the recent media release from Federal Minister for Homelessness and Housing Julie Collins on a major policy announcement for homelessness and housing. For further information, please see Government's media release, Home Time media release, AAP story or ABC story for the full rundown and reaction.

As part of the Home Time campaign, Hope Street welcomes $1 billion from the National Housing Infrastructure Facility (NHIF) being allocated to young people with no home and women and their children escaping violence. This important announcement has the potential to support young people and young families fleeing domestic and family violence and seeking frontline services at Hope Street. This important funding is set to increase the supply of social housing, of which Melbourne’s north Hope Street is a strong advocate.

As a leading youth homelessness organisation, 22% of young people that use Hope Street services have experienced family and domestic violence in the last financial year. This has a significant impact on their sense of wellbeing and sense of safety. Young people experiencing homelessness in Australia is at crisis levels. As such, these much-needed resources to respond to youth homelessness in Victoria are vital for frontline services. Hope Street’s ability to respond to domestic and family violence with wrap around, case by case support is nation leading for youth homelessness. As such, further federal funding for the sector ensures that high quality support can be offered to young people and young families in crisis. Hope Street welcomes this financial injection into social housing and homelessness services and awaits further detail on the announcement to see how it can be applied to current successful service delivery outcomes with the Hope Street model.

“New resources to deliver crisis and transitional accommodation for women and children fleeing domestic violence and young people at risk of homelessness will make a life-changing difference to each family and young person who will now have a safe home,” -Kate Colvin, Homelessness Australia.

As part of the Home Time campaign, targeting the NHIF to young people has been a major campaign ask over the past six months and Hope Street welcomes the decision. “It is time that young people be recognised as their own cohort when experiencing homelessness and fleeing domestic and family violence.” - Donna Bennett, Chief Executive Officer, Hope Street.

Donna Bennett, Hope Street Chief Executive Officer, is a long-term advocate and industry leader on the need to recognise children and young people in their own right when experiencing homelessness. Furthermore, for resources to be allocated accordingly with youth specific strategies and wrap-around support to be provided to young people and young families. “Currently only 0.4% of social housing and public housing is provided to young people, although they make up the largest cohort of homeless people in Australia. In Victoria, 25 percent of people experience homelessness are under the age of 25.”

According to the Home Time campaign, the new National Agreement on Social Housing and Homelessness (NASHH) needs to prioritise children and young people with no home and ensure that dedicated tenancies for young people are linked to support services and payments to cover the rental gap for providers.

That is the Home Time campaign’s next objective, and it will start having conversations at federal, state and territory levels immediately and will continue raising these issues in the media and with local MPs. Hope Street is committed to continue to support the Home Time campaign and to raise awareness for Hope Street’s nation leading First Response Youth Service – crisis response model as well as its youth housing foyer-like models operating in Melbourne’s north and west. As a nation leading frontline response, Hope Street has established and tested models with demonstrated success in achieving outcomes for young people in 5 domains: health and wellbeing; living skills; community connection; education, employment and training; tenancy management and budgeting. In collaboration with local and wider communities, Hope Street strives to achieve its vision of a society in which all young people and young families have a safe place to call home.