The UK Coalition on Older Homelessness

Home | Site Map | FAQ | Feedback

Practice

Advice, Advocacy and Support - London - Threshold Housing Advice

Threshold Housing Advice is an independent advice agency with two advice centres based in Wandsworth, South London and Hammersmith, West London. It is a company limited by guarantee and a registered charity, founded in 1973 to help single homeless people and couples without dependent children. It provides housing advice, resettlement and access to emergency accommodation, including hostels and the private rented sector (including rent in advance and a deposit bond scheme).
Work with older people Threshold started work with older people in 1996 because of concern that they were not getting many older clients (55+), especially from minority ethnic communities. Discussion with other advice agencies revealed the same pattern: older people did not come into office-based advice agencies in the same way that younger people did. The initial focus was on an outreach housing advice for ethnic elders. Two posts were created under the Elderly Outreach Project, one in Wandsworth and one in Hammersmith. A third post was created in Wandsworth which has worked with both minority and white UK older people and had a brief to develop the use of volunteers.
The work started by developing links with day centres, including those used especially by ethnic elders, and with Asian and Afro-Caribbean community groups. The service is now well-known and receives referrals through word-of-mouth and from other statutory and voluntary agencies. Work includes:
* Supporting people to make homelessness applications and challenge negative decisions * Advising people on tenancy and benefits problems, helping them stay in their existing housing if that is their wish * Finding more suitable housing if they prefer to move
Clients often come back to Threshold if they experience further problems. Because Threshold has a legal help franchise, a few cases can be funded through that route, but some older people are not eligible because of the nature of their problem or the income and capital limits.
The service-users Because of the ethnic focus of two of the posts and the mixed local community, the majority of clients are from minority communities. However, the third post has developed expertise in regulated or protected private tenancies (the old Rent Act tenancies prior to 1989) and most of these are white UK. Because Threshold is a housing advice agency, many clients are already housed, although their housing is often insecure, including:
* Hidden homelessness with friends or relatives * Insecure private tenancies * Local authority temporary accommodation following homelessness
642 elders used the service in the year April 2000 - April 2001.
Staffing / links to other agencies There are currently three full-time staff, all committed housing advice specialists; one holds post-graduate diplomas in law and legal practice, and another speaks four Asian languages. There is regular supervision with the Assistant Director at the Wandsworth Centre, and the Team Leader at the Hammersmith Centre. Legal work is checked under the quality control mechanisms set in place under the Legal Services Commission Franchise.
Threshold liaises closely with local and London-wide statutory and voluntary agencies. The elders work involves liaison with local authorities (especially environmental health, tenancy relations and social services), the Rent Service, Age Concern, Care and Repair, benefits offices, housing providers (especially sheltered housing), community groups and day centres.
Funding The two ethnic elders housing advice posts were funded by HACT (the Housing Associations Charitable Trust) and three large charitable trusts (the City Parochial Foundation, the Tudor Trust and the Bridge House Estates Trust Fund) from 1996 to 2000. The third post was funded by a two year grant (1999-2001) under the Older Homeless People Programme by HACT and Help the Aged. The work is currently funded by grants from the Community Fund (three posts, one with tapered funding). Overall funding for Threshold comes from a variety of statutory and charitable sources, including local authority contracts and the Legal Services Commission.
New developments / future plans Threshold are currently in discussion with Help the Aged concerning funding under the new Housing Advice Programme.
Key issues / lessons learned The idea of using volunteers originated because of the time-consuming nature of the work, with home visits all over south and west London, and the fact that some of the work was wider than housing advice. Threshold had no experience of working with volunteers, and was determined that any volunteer programme should include stringent training and supervision, and attention to health and safety issues.
Although some good volunteers have been recruited and trained, it has taken longer than expected and it has not always been easy to link them to older people. Some older people do not want volunteer involvement themselves (although they think it is a good idea, in principle, for other older people!). Volunteers have been used creatively, for example in taking older people round to look at different sheltered housing schemes, as well as in more routine tasks such as helping clients to fill in housing application forms. One volunteer is herself a qualified solicitor and she has helped with technical matters such as researching the tenancy status of a client.
The team of specialist staff provides a resource to other advisers, both within Threshold and more widely. One staff member has developed an expertise in dealing with the complexities of the old regulated/protected tenancies, something which most housing advice staff come across only rarely.
Contact details
Telephone
Fax
Email

Practice

Advice, Advocacy and Support
Drug and Alcohol Services
Supported Accommodation
Day Centres
Outreach and Tenancy Sustainment

Site by: Stephen Willcock Consultants