UnitingCare Australia is calling on our Federal and State Governments to urgently develop and commit to a National Housing Strategy to address the growing crisis of homelessness in Australia.
This week is National Homelessness Week. There are more than 116 000 people without a home and almost 195 000 families on social housing waiting lists across Australia.
Refugee advocates celebrated today, as they publicly launched the Asylum Seeker Hub (ASH) Public Transport Concession.
Kim Ellwood, Acting Executive Director of the Office of Multicultural Interests opened proceedings, and said that 38 people have already been issued with the concession, which provides refugees and asylum seekers with a concession fare SmartRider, for use on Transperth services.
It’s been an incredibly tough time for people in the bush, especially our Aussie farmers. In the latest issue of Frontier News, Greg and Bethany Stace, share their struggle with the ongoing drought and how Outback Links volunteers made a difference to their family.
“It’s been really difficult with this drought, so having these volunteers really saves us…You can sit down and have a chat over a meal. It gives you a mental break from the stress,” said Greg.
As the week of action to Raise the Rate of Newstart gets underway today, UnitingCare Australia echoes calls for an immediate increase to Newstart and Youth Allowance payment levels to ensure their adequacy in meeting basic living costs.
UnitingCare Australia is also renewing its call for the establishment of an independent mechanism to assess the adequacy of all income support payments and adjust rates to acceptable levels.
UnitingCare Australia has warned the possibility of a ‘perfect storm’ emerging in aged care, as older Australians face the prospect of being unable to access the supports they need. This is due to a deepening crisis of providers lacking the financial resources to meet the demands of quality service provision.
Informed by numerous recent reports that reveal the unsustainable financial performance of aged care providers across both ‘in-home’ and residential aged care settings, National Director of UnitingCare Australia, Claerwen Little, said the perfect storm forming is a direct result of increasing pressure on providers to deliver services in an unsustainable funding environment.
A suite of 15 new resources from Uniting Network have been launched with the aim of supporting Uniting Church congregations which seek to fully affirm LGBTIQ people, same-sex couples and families.
“Uniting Network is proud to have produced a comprehensive series of resources on LGBTIQ related topics to assist congregations and faith communities who are looking to explore what it means to be inclusive and affirming,” said Hannah Reeve, Uniting Network National Co-Convener.
More than 150 religious leaders from across Australia have issued an open letter calling on Prime Minister Scott Morrison to recognise Australia’s moral responsibility to avoid climate catastrophe and halt all new coal and gas projects.
The religious leaders span the spectrum of faiths and include the heads of the National Council of Churches, Muslims Australia, the Uniting Church in Australia, the Federation of Australian Buddhist Councils, as well as the Grand Mufti of Australia, Bishops, senior Rabbis and leading theologians.
When you are experiencing homelessness, winter in Perth can seem endless. For UnitingCare West, the onset of winter has seen an increase in the numbers of people seeking assistance.
The latest copy of The Big Issue states that “more than 116 000 Australians don’t have a place to call home each night – and more than 8 000 of these people are sleeping rough”.
Indeed, I’ve noticed an increase in the number of rough sleepers in the doorways, parks, alleyways and on pavements in Perth’s CBD over the past year or so. Many of them depend on the charity of passers-by and/or charitable organisations for the wherewithal to continue living.
How can we be so hard-hearted to see these unfortunate human beings struggling to keep alive, whilst doing so little to help them, in what is claimed to be a nation built on Christian values?
UnitingCare West’s Rainbow Lunch celebrated its 20th anniversary this month. Around 100 past and present volunteers and friends gathered at Maylands Mt Lawley Uniting Church to mark the occasion.
Rainbow Lunches are a social group, set in churches, inviting people who are experiencing mental illness or loneliness to join them for lunch and a chance to connect with other people in the community.
Larissa Muir, Senior Project Officer NDIS Transition at UnitingCare West, said that Rainbow has quietly evolved over the past 20 years, beginning with a focus on befriending people living with mental illness and now expanding to other areas to include people in all sorts of situations, such as those who are vulnerable to homelessness, those who have exited prison, as well as people that have battled physical illness or are awaiting a transplant.