Press release homeless minors 11 october 2016 eng

Press release DATE 11 October 2016

'Almost one in three homeless people is underage'

Children's Rights Commissioner presents new dossier: 'with(out) a home. Homelessness from a child's perspective' The Office of the Children's Rights Commissioner spoke with 43 parents, children and young people who were homeless, or were about to become homeless. It investigated whether the legal framework takes into account children and adolescents. And, from a child's perspective, it analysed the data of 'Baseline measurement homelessness 2014' by Evy Meys and Koen Hermans.

It is the first time that the housing policy area has been so thoroughly analysed from a child's perspective.

Each year, hundreds of children and parents can no longer stay in their homes. For various reasons, they are forced to move out. Almost one in three homeless people is underage. In 2014 1,728 children stayed in homelessness care, a passage house or winter shelter. Or they were faced with an eviction warrant requisition. Or they were given guidance by a supervised housing service. Most children have been living in an uncertain living situation for more than six months.

In one out of four claims for eviction, children are involved. In 2014 12,958 procedures for eviction were started in Flanders.

In 2015 the Housing Inspectorate found 2,391 people were victims of hovel rental. 1/5 of these victims (21.46%) were minors. This included eight babies less than one year old.

Homeless children and adolescents are extra vulnerable Homelessness has grave consequences for children. Several times they change neighbourhoods, schools, friends and neighbours. Each time, they have to start again. It compromises their physical and psychological well-being, their health and development. It shapes their future. Homelessness not only affects their right of housing, but also their other rights such as right of privacy, friends, leisure, school. Minors live in the shadow of adults, their legal representatives. They become refugees in their own country.

Seven policy recommendations       

Make homeless children visible in statistics and policy plans Strengthen the housing rights of children via a commissioner for housing rights Work on the causes. Increase the focus on preventive supportive housing Ensure short-term and child-friendly shelter Collaboration on all levels Search for local solutions Continue to focus on a social housing policy

Homelessness among children is a "both/and" story. Therefore, the Office of the Children's Rights Commissioner puts forward recommendations on homelessness and its related domains. This includes housing and rental policy, issues with housing and malpractice on the rental market, preventive approach to evictions, poverty reduction and tackling domestic violence.

Make homeless children visible We hardly know how many children and adolescents are homeless. In legislation and policy plans on homelessness and on housing rental policy, they often remain in the shadows of adults.

Systematically collect statistics on children and adolescents. Figures alone are not enough. They must form the basis of translating the policy towards children and adolescents.

Reinforce children's right to housing Housing is a fundamental right. Also for children. Nevertheless, children and adolescents live in the shadows of the adult world. Housing insecurity causes stress and puts pressure on a healthy child's life.

Minors are legally incapacitated. They depend on their parents for their standard of living. Via their parents they have access to income support, homelessness care, the social rental market or bringing matters before a mediator judge.

Parents and children in the perception research are always told by the police, tenants' association and lawyers that they have right on their side, yet they are made homeless. They have their backs against the wall, because they don't have the money to fight the matter legally, and no home to offer them shelter in the meantime.

Landlord changed the locks I had a tenancy agreement for three years. I paid 700 euros for a small apartment with two bedrooms and a small shower room. Everything was broken. Suddenly, the owner wanted 1,000 euros per month. I can't afford that. I took my contract to a lawyer. He said that the owner would have to give me three months' notice. But on the fifth day, the owner closed off everything. No water, no more electricity. He changed the lock. We couldn't enter our home. I went to the police, because I had to get back inside.

Everything was there: 2,000 euros, the kids' textbooks, their clothes and toys. When I was able to get back in, our apartment was almost empty. The owner says he doesn't know a thing about it. (Sarah, single mother, five children, family shelter)

Appoint the commissioner for housing rights as requested by the Flemish Housing Council. This commissioner should inspect the housing policy for compliance with the fundamental right of housing. He monitors the housing policy, reports to policy makers and fulfils a role as ombudsman to solve individual complaints about violations of the housing law.

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Focus on the causes of homelessness

Aim for a widespread and comprehensive development of preventive supportive housing From a child's perspective, preventive supportive housing is crucial. Parents and children can continue to count on their home, their school, their friends and their connection to the neighbourhood.

Supportive housing Katrien from supportive housing helps us to clear up. She helps us to make a plan. The housing company contacted her, so we're not in it alone. In the beginning we thought: why is she meddling in our business? It's difficult to accept help. (Nancy and Erik, two children, supportive housing)

Examples from other European countries show that supportive housing is around seven times cheaper than eviction, shelter and rehousing and that supportive housing can successfully prevent evictions.

Especially if the guidance is involved from an early stage, if both private and social tenants can make use of it, if the guidance is intensive, flexible and multidisciplinary (for example focuses on housing skills, budget guidance, debt mediation, administrative guidance, tackling a lack of protection) and if sufficient means are made available to the guidance services.

For instance, in Sweden local welfare actors are required to visit the family and to guide them once the first rental arrears pile up.

Ensure a wide-spread and overall expansion of preventive supportive housing with extra attention for the need of preventive supportive housing in the private rental market.

Poverty and debt Many homeless families and children live in poverty. Their income is very low.

More than half of these children grow up in a family with debts. One extra

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setback, invoice or fine can land the family in housing insecurity, with extra debt as a result.

Debts continue to increase A bailiff came here once. It concerned debts of mine. For a mobile phone subscription, about 1,000 euros. And hospital bills for the boys. I agreed with the bailiff to pay 50 euros per month for the phone bills. But now I'm here, I haven't paid for two months.

He can't do much now, but I don't like the idea of them visiting once I'm living alone. So I visit the Public Centre for Social Welfare to draw up a plan. (Miranda, single mother, three children, women's shelter)

Ensure a more structural approach towards (child) poverty. Decent housing is a fundamental right and a basic facility. Continue to invest in budget guidance, humanise the tackling of debts, focus on children and approach the situation as a whole.

Fleeing violence Children and adolescents risk becoming homeless due to violence.

They flee the violence at home alone or with their parent, brothers or sisters.

They end up on the streets and become homeless.

Relationship problems and intra-family violence We're here because of what happened. My dad hurt my mum. He would hit my mum with a rope. He would hit her over the head with a chair. He accidentally hit my arm once. It was in a cast for a while. He said my mum had another man, but that's not true. (Sofia, daughter of Nora, single mother, four children, women's shelter)

As a child they end up in a youth institution or in foster care. They run away.

Being young and adolescent as an additional risk I don't see my mum anymore. I don't want to see her either. She abandoned me and my older brother. She left my dad, even though he hit us. He would lock us up. He would hardly give us anything to eat. One day my brother said: let's go, we're running away. I peed my pants because I was so scared, but we did it anyway. We fled to Ostend. We stayed in an empty apartment there. We were picked up by the policy because we stole food. From then on, they placed my brother and me in a youth institution. (Joke, single mother, one child, women's shelter)

No minor may become homeless due to a lack of availability in the youth assistance or guidance or relocation possibilities.

As a government, remain alert to the lack of youth care provision in crisis situations. Make additional efforts for minors who are threatened to be without shelter or a home due to a lack of continuity in their care.

Adolescents are extra vulnerable to homelessness As adolescents, they remain extra vulnerable as they cannot rely on a stable home. Once they become of age, the adolescents staying in a youth institution lose the protection of youth care, and are on their own. They end up on the streets more easily, temporarily slipping through the net.

Recently of age and released from an institution When I was fifteen, I moved to my father in Antwerp. I was living in France with my mum. I fought with my stepmom a lot. I called the Pupil Guidance Centre to ask what I should do. I wanted to leave. I was in different youth institutions. I stayed in Antwerp, Mechelen and Leuven. I ran away very often. I would go to friends. When I turned 18, the Juvenile Court said I could leave. The Public Centre for Social Welfare found me a hotel room. I got pregnant. The Public Centre for Social Welfare found me a place in a

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women's shelter. I was in three different women's shelters. From there you have to find your own flat. I live in a small apartment from the social renting office and am guided by a supportive housing service. (Maria, single mother, one child, supportive housing)

Due to the shortage of independent living assistance, adolescents can sometimes only receive it once they have reached the age of majority, at which point they have to start their application for assistance again from scratch. Independent living assistance services CBAW and BZW report a lack of suitable housing in the lowest rental segment, which means adolescents do not receive assistance fast enough.

Dedicate more resources to CBAW and BZW. Adolescents must be able to rely on a buddy during the transition from minority to majority.

Eviction Parents and children can be evicted due to overdue rent, the sale of the property, a dispute with the owner. Not every eviction is carried out by legislative means. To avoid rent arrears, families sometimes move on their own initiative. From one day to the next, families with a precarious residence status can no longer enter their home as the locks have been changed. If it is carried out by legislative means, some parents try to delay the actual eviction to avoid becoming homeless.

Eviction I receive an invalidity allowance and have a collective debt settlement. I am in debt because I couldn't afford my son's medical bills. My rental apartment is being sold. I have to leave in a month.

The matter has already been brought before a mediator judge. I want an eviction procedure. Then I can buy some time between the apartment and the women's shelter. Otherwise my children and I will be out on the streets.

(Petra, single mother, three children, rental apartment)

Avoid eviction of children and adolescents. Maximise the focus on preventive supportive housing. The interests of the child must take precedence in the decisions of the mediator judge in the case of evictions.

Ensure short-term and child-friendly shelter When parents, children and adolescents who are, or are about to be, homeless, end up in crisis reception, a family shelter, women's shelter or passage house, this period should be as short-term as possible. A new home should be found as fast as possible. Extra investments in the housing supply are of prime importance.

Due to the shortage of suitable homes, parents, children and adolescents are sometimes forced to stay in the same or different forms of shelter in different locations.

Sometimes children change schools several times.

They know perfectly well that the school is temporary, that we won't be here for long. I told them: don't make too many friends, don't get too attached.

(Leen, single mother, two children, refuge)

Long periods of stays in a shelter take their toll, especially when there are barely any perspectives of leaving. Stress and despair weigh on the relationships. Tensions increase. Debts accumulate if the Public Centre for Social Welfare does not intervene. Parent and child are in a constant situation of temporariness, while their greatest needs are stability and constancy.

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Ensure that the care is child-friendly and as short-term as possible. Invest in preventive supportive housing, to prevent that children, adolescents and parents are evicted.

Collaborate on all levels Parents and children testify that collaboration can make an essential difference for all parties.

If parents and children have little money and the Public Centre for Social Welfare does not support them, despite the protocol between the centres for general welfare (CAWs) and the Public Centres for Social Welfare, receiving shelter in homeless care is not evident.

Suddenly school fees aren't paid anymore I don't know if it's a mistake of the Public Centre for Social Welfare or my assistant. I don't understand. At home I had the same assistant for three years and I never had any issues with the Public Centre for Social Welfare or school or the children. Now many school fees aren't refunded anymore.

(Sarah, single mother, five children, family shelter).

Good and smooth cooperation between homelessness care, youth care, education and youth policy is required. It can make a difference for the right of family life, family support and education of homeless children.

Strengthen the local housing and welfare policy Local governments have many instruments to prevent homeless children from becoming refugees in their own country.

Parents and children testify to differences between local governments. They enter in discussions with local governments to enforce their rights. The material services differ from one municipality to another.

Children, adolescents and parents are forced to leave their own region as they cannot find decent shelter or a decent home in their own municipality.

A different Public Centre for Social Welfare did help me I'd already applied for support from the Public Centre for Social Welfare. But the woman from the Public Centre for Social Welfare refused to give it to me, as I still have my mum. She thought I should live there. She didn't understand that wasn't an option. In the end, I applied for help at a different Public Centre for Social Welfare and they didn't give me any trouble at all.

(Tania, adolescent, youth shelter)

Parents, adolescents and children aren't always aware of where they can go when they're about to become homeless. They are in the dark, and feel like they're being sent from place to place.

Search for information I have to go and search for everything for my children myself. To know what my rights are, where I can ask for help. That's why the community centre home is convenient. It's a place where you can tell your story. There are always at least one or two mothers and fathers who have experienced the same and say: 'Have you been there yet, have you already checked if you're entitled to that?' (Petra, single mother, three children, rental apartment)

Direct more resources to local housing policy, including homelessness policy.

Local governments can prevent children from becoming refugees in their own country. The local authorities can't do that alone. Make Flemish and federal means and supervision available.

Raise awareness of the housing point or the housing office of the municipality. Residents and people with the greatest need of housing must have access to this.

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Continue to focus on a social housing policy It won't come as a surprise that the greatest wish of the children and parents in the perception research is to have their own home. A place where they feel happy, can build a family life and secure their future.

Shelter is temporary by definition. Parents and adolescents talk about their discouraging search for a suitable and affordable home. They continue to experience different thresholds which impede their access to housing: rental costs are too high, discrimination in the private rental market, and a shortage of social rental housing Some people end up in rental housing at the bottom end of the private market, as these are the only ones they can afford.

Starting capital?

You can't save, you can't do anything. You really need starting capital to start something. You need a deposit for a home. It takes a while to have that money, you know? (Rachid, adolescent, youth shelter)

In 2016, the Housing Support Centre calculated that more than 90,000 families are on waiting lists of social housing companies and social letting agencies.

Continue to invest in social housing. Make the private market more accessible for vulnerable families. And strengthen social renting.

End of message Interview with the Children’s Rights Commissioner?

Hilde Cnudde, communication adviser hilde.cnudde@vlaamsparlement.be Direct: 02-552 41 06 – Mobile: 0473-98 04 09 – Secretariat: 02-552 98 00 You can also follow the live stream via: https://www.youtube.com/user/Kinderrechtencom The dossier 'With(out) a home. Homelessness from a child's perspective' will be online as of 11 October 2016: http://www.kinderrechtencommissariaat.be/actueel/studiedag-nergens-kindaan-huis On a daily basis, the Flemish Office of the Children's Rights Commissioner receives signs from children, young people, and professionals. We mediate, investigate complaints and provide policy advice - always with a view to compliance with and the application of children's rights in Flanders. The Office of the Children's Rights Commissioner is the Flemish advocate of children's rights and was created by the Flemish Parliament.

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