[Marie Sillars]

I had a visit today from a 53 year old Tenant of my CHP, she has been homeless and couch surfing for a while also turning up for work at one stage. This lady has NO family and is totally alone, she was moved by FACS to a tiny 1 bedroom unit in the Northern Suburbs of Sydney and this place has thick mould, rats and 2 men who live there who are mentally unstable. One of these men has threatened her and an AVO has been placed on him. He sits outside her bedroom window with a black mask and hoodie and is following her when she attends TAFE. (I saw all the paperwork) and she approached the CHP for help, she has been treated really badly by them and is about ready for a breakdown & feeling suicidal. They offered her another 1 bedroom hovel and she refused it, she knows nothing about the system and has even offered to go to Mosman House or Beecroft House just to feel safe and she told me today that she would be “safer on the street”. This has been a real shock for me today but I am sure that CHPs have NO Duty of Care at all. I have put some of this on Twitter and copied our CEO into it as the mismanagement is so apparent, I just had no choice to put this out there. This lady is part of our Tenant Advisory Group and was told that she should maybe leave as she is too stressed (Ive told her to stay with it) Im getting my “fighting pants” on as I write this, time to go into battle!

[Marie Sillars]

Happy to report that this Lady has finally moved into a safe place where she does not have to live in fear. Finally they found her a “Head Lease” property but it took a lot of arguments and stress…..happy to say that she can finally live peacefully though and is so happy!

[Wendy]

Fantastic new Marie! I know how you feel, having helped a woman who was living in a room with no fridge for 4 years. She is now in State Housing and calls her home, her “castle”!

[Gemma White]

Wow Marie, what great advocacy! And it just shows how we need to make sure that Community Housing providers are as accountable as the state is for public housing. We need better regulation for Community Housing. I’m so glad your friend is ok. I hope she can stay in her new place long term…

[Marie Sillars]

This very much seems to place the difference between PH & CHPs, the “Duty of Care” aspect seems to be very low in Community Housing and they are prone to advertise how wonderful they are without doing the hard work to protect people. Yes, we can take them to Tribunal but the stress levels in doing these types of things is pretty high. They seem to answer to no one!

[Author]

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