Haven; Home, Safe braces for increased demand for services post-Christmas

But a Bendigo-based homelessness support and low income housing agency is bracing for a spike in demand.

More than 115 people in Bendigo experienced housing crises or homelessness in December last year, according to Haven; Home, Safe.

Of those, 79 people were in short-term or emergency housing, while 37 were “sleeping rough”.

The agency is expecting similar numbers this year.

Haven; Home, Safe chief executive, Ken Marchingo, said there was an expectation that Christmas should be a fabulous time for families and young children.

“But often, it’s a perfect storm of what can go wrong, does go wrong,” he said. 

“There’s a lot of help and assistance out there… but it’s not unusual and it’s not unheard of that people will make poor financial choices to see the kids get a little bit spoilt at this one time of the year.”

Financial stress linked to overspending was one of the key issues the agency said clients would seek help for post-Christmas until March.

“The cascading effects of utility bills, getting the kids back to school, and paying off Christmas credit card [debts] really has a disproportionate effect on the poor,” Mr Marchingo said.

And it wasn’t only the household budget that could suffer.

“At this time of the year we see families attempting to reunite and getting together for Christmas. That doesn’t always work out,” Mr Marchingo said.

Relationship breakdown was another of the key issues for which people sought help from Haven. 

Accommodation, gifts for children and food hampers were among the most common requests for assistance.

“We struggle every day right through the year to find crisis and temporary accommodation for people, but it’s just that much harder at this time of the year,” Mr Marchingo said.

He said the number of people returning to the region for family reasons during Christmas also contributed to demand.

Mr Marchingo welcomed Harvest Food and Wine’s efforts to help address the issue, and the support of all organisations and individuals in the Bendigo community. 

Victory Church provided Haven with 45 hampers on Tuesday, shortly before the Bendigo Advertiser spoke with Mr Marchingo.

But he said more needed to be done at all levels of government to create solutions.