Housing

We recognise that fleeing domestic violence is a dangerous time; women are at greatest risk of homicide at the point of separation or after leaving a violent partner*. A study of 200 women’s experiences of domestic violence commissioned by Women’s Aid found that 60% of the women left their homes because they feared that they or their children would be killed by the perpetrator**. 
 
Our borough based housing partnership aims to bring together housing services and providers to improve the collective responses to domestic violence. We work with specific services to deliver core projects (see Who We Work With) and keep our main housing services and providers informed of local developments and resources (see Key Housing Services and Providers).

The housing partnership developed the Housing Operational Group to ensure that victim/survivors (with or without children) receive consistent, appropriate and professional support when approaching housing services and housing providers in LBHF.  The group strives to facilitate increased safety and reduction of risk for domestic violence survivors and their children through early intervention and improved access to rehousing and support services.  The group has four primary objectives: to deliver safe, consistent services; to improve coordinated working; to provide clear and accessible information about housing services in the borough; and to improve the local response to perpetrators.

Standing Together’s Housing Coordinator works as part of this coordinated response to domestic violence, to ensure the delivery and on-going development of policies, procedures, information, service delivery, and positive outcomes for survivors. 

The Housing Operational Group’s ‘Action Plan’ for the borough is now an on-going programme rather than a hopeful declaration of intent.

Since the Operational Group’s inception in 2009, the number of Housing Association referrals to the Multi-Agency Risk Assessment Conference (MARAC) has increased annually.  The head of the Home Office's Violent Crime Unit, and Chair of the National MARAC Steering Group, recently commended the LBHF MARAC as having one of the highest rates of referrals from housing.

The Housing Coordinator mapped the housing providers serving LBHF and the domestic violence services their tenants could access, including the survivor’s pathways, through Housing Options, H&F Homes (who have now merged with LBHF Housing Services), Notting Hill Housing Group (NHHG), and Shepherds Bush Housing Association (SBHA).

We reviewed the joint working practices of Housing Options and H&F Homes and coordinated the development of their joint domestic violence housing procedure, a positive example of coordinated working.

We developed the domestic violence Housing Minimum Service Standards Project and began its implementation for 2010-2012 by coordinating initial self-assessments of SBHA, NHHG, LBHF and H&F Homes. We also reviewed and improved the Sanctuary Scheme to ensure cost effectiveness for the council and improved service for survivors, and drafted a tri-borough report to further review potential improvements for LBHF in 2011.