Stories from single mothers and front-line service providers.

A homelessness plan for Tāmaki Makaurau

Auckland Council is working with partners to develop a regional, cross sectoral homelessness plan for Tāmaki Makaurau.

Partners include government agencies, nongovernment service providers, philanthropic organisations, mana whenua, academia and the private sector.

The plan will deliver collaborative, cross sectoral initiatives for the Auckland region, to ensure homelessness is rare, brief and non-recurring.

Bringing the voice of people with lived experience

To inform the development of the plan, Auckland Council's Affordable Housing Policy team commissioned Innovation Unit to understand people's lived experience of housing instability. This included the triggers that cause people to become homeless, the barriers they face in seeking support and finding suitable housing, and what enables them to then secure stable housing. Auckland Council also wanted to understand the impact of their experience of unstable housing.

Focusing on single mothers who have experienced homelessness

To narrow the scope of the research, Auckland Council asked the Innovation Unit to focus specially on single women with children who have experienced homelessness, or intense housing insecurity. This is because single mothers and their children are known to be particularly vulnerable to homelessness and if we can get solutions right for this group of people, there would be learnings for addressing the needs of other vulnerable groups too.

September 2018