Unintended Consequences: The Impact of Delivery Systems on Homelessness in the Nepean/Blacktown Region: Final Report

In 2010 the Federal Minister for Housing launched the Nepean Blacktown Regional Taskforce on Homelessness to develop a Regional Plan to End Homelessness by 2020. The research project is part of the Taskforce’s regional plan process. This report presents findings of a study which sought to discover the extent to which service provider practices and service delivery systems might unintentionally cause or perpetuate homelessness amongst specific cohorts: youth, women with children, and single men. Anecdotal reports suggested that maldistribution of services, gaps and waiting periods, targeting and eligibility restrictions, and conflicting agency policies and boundaries, might actually contribute to homelessness in the region. The study, conducted in partnership with the Nepean Regional Taskforce on Homelessness, utilises administrative and ‘occasion of service’ data collected on homeless and at-risk people from key agencies operating in four local government areas in Western Sydney (Blacktown, Penrith, Hawkesbury and Blue Mountains) together with interviews and focus groups involving agency personnel. Until recently, Australian literature pertaining to homelessness has tended to focus on the numbers of the homeless. Studies that focuses on other aspects of homelessness such as systemic barriers to maintaining housing and the role that service provider practices might play in contributing to homelessness, rather than on the homeless themselves, have been less common.