Homeless women are being turned away in their
hundreds from crisis accommodation in Sydney due
to a shortage of beds, a leading service provider
says.
The 23-bed Kings Cross crisis accommodation
service A Woman's Place provided refuge for 600
women over the past year but operator Mission
Australia said it had to turn away more than 1,000 due
to a lack of resources.
Mission Australia said it was the same story across
Sydney as the number of beds failed to match rising
numbers of homeless women.
There are currently only 150 crisis accommodation
beds for homeless single women in the Sydney
metropolitan area with none west of
Parramatta.
Mission Australia spokeswoman Anne Hampshire
said homeless men had access to a wider pool of
services and accommodation but women were
overlooked.
"There are not enough services for women,
particularly single women who are without partners or
children," Ms Hampshire said.
"This is despite the fact that 42 per cent of the
country's homeless population are women."
The increase in numbers was due to women being
less likely to stay in violent relationships and an influx
of women from the country looking for work, she said.
Sydney's gentrification was also to blame, she said,
as cheap boarding houses gave way to upmarket
developments and tourist accommodation.
There were an estimated 1,200 boarding houses in
the inner-city in 2003-04 compared to fewer than 300
today, Ms Hampshire said.
"Mission Australia isn't suggesting taking beds away
from men's services but increasing women's beds
across the city," she said.
