No Fixed Abode: Exposing the hidden effects of Hawke's Bay's housing crisis

Hawke's Bay's homeless community face additional challenges, particularly in accessing healthcare and participating in civic processes. Photo / NZME

EDITORIAL:

No fixed abode.

Three simple words. An elegant euphemism for a complex and confronting issue that restricts a large part of our population from accessing parts of daily life.

Put simply, it's called homelessness.

It encompasses those sleeping rough on the streets, people living in the back of their cars, couch surfers relying on friends and family, as well as people with less conventional lifestyles, like the fisherman who doesn't keep a permanent residence.

NO_FIXED_ABODE

There are also those who choose this particular way of life.

However, it also covers families pushed into emergency accommodation after their rental was sold, women and children living in shelters, and others living in transitional housing, in what Whatever It Takes Trust general manager Shirley Lammas described as living in a "holding pattern".

The lack of a permanent address presents many challenges and barriers to accessing basic everyday services.

It may mean struggling to get a doctor's appointment with already stretched GP clinics - even for pregnant women in need of antenatal care.

If you also have addiction issues, it can mean difficulty getting a bank account or eftpos card.

Without access to certain technologies or the internet, important community messages can be missed.

Shirley Lammas, general manager of Whatever It Takes Trust, said homelessness was a complex issue that requires an understanding of the many people it encompasses. Photo / NZME

This also limits the ability to engage in political processes and advocate for policies that may improve their quality of life.

For one Hawke's Bay man, and probably many others, it meant not being allowed to attend his own court case as he could not provide the court with a fixed abode for contact tracing purposes under current Covid-19 alert level settings.

Those are just some of the stories shared with Hawke's Bay Today through the course of the past few weeks.

What struck me was the number of people I spoke to about this topic who suddenly realised they'd never thought to ask these questions. They'd never thought about the challenges those with no fixed abode might face.

And I think perhaps that's the biggest challenge facing the broad range of people who fall under the label of "no fixed abode".

Those same barriers that prevent them from accessing everyday services, prevent people like you and me - those with access to the internet or enough spare change to buy tomorrow's paper - from hearing their stories.

Tucked away from our view we don't know about the challenges they face and their issues are invisible to us.

It's up to us to try to bridge these gaps.

I'm not ignorant of the fact this series hasn't included many perspectives from the homeless community, and I hope to have one day earned enough of their trust to tell their stories.

Stories alone won't help. Lammas describes it as a full community intervention that is needed.

"This is a 'we', this is an 'us'," she said.

I hope the region is listening to her.