Ageing in what place? Stage one: case studies

• Shelley Mallett, Trish Westmore
• Hanover Welfare Services

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Report cover: Ageing in what place?

02 August 2011Australia is facing significant demographic shifts over the next decade as the population grows and ages. Currently, services for the ageing population are fragmented with no single government department assuming responsibility for older Australians in all their diversity.

Homelessness and housing services are reporting an increase in aged people presenting for assistance with no (recent) history of homelessness. Older Australians in private rental, or those entering private rental for the first time, appear to be particularly vulnerable. While the population is diverse, these people all have insecure tenure and limited income.

In Australia there is no coherent response for older people in housing crisis or at risk of homelessness. In Victoria, the service response for the aged is focused on individuals with chronic health issues and homeless histories. Currently, the homelessness service sector doesn’t provide a clearly differentiated response to those at risk of housing crisis or homelessness who are ageing.

Over the past twelve months, Hanover Welfare Services conducted an action research project, funded by the William Buckland Foundation, examining older individual’s pathways into housing crisis and homelessness.

Our broad research questions were:

1. What individual systemic and structural factors put older Australians at risk of housing crisis and homelessness?

2. What policies and services exist to support vulnerable older Australians and improve/maintain/protect their health and wellbeing?

3. How do personal circumstances and local policy and services create pathways into and out of homelessness?

4. What policy and service responses are needed to protect older Australians from entering either housing crisis or the homeless service system?