UnitingCare Wesley Adelaide

Ref:5/2003

15 April, 2003

Mental Health Housing – URGENT

Adelaide Central Mission has been an active provider of services to the people of South Australia since 1901.  During this time the organisation has seen many social changes, most instigated by Government policy changes.  Adelaide Central Mission is supportive of the 1990’s move to ‘deinstitutionalisation’ with the proviso that sufficient funds are also released into the community to provide quality support to the people who would have previously been supported by the institutional care model.

The Mission is considering responses that it can make to the Human Services report on accommodation for people with mental illness. “We do not believe that appropriate funds have been released into the community and we therefore believe that some people who would have experienced the security and support of an institutional setting are now in many cases left in an unsupported and insecure relationship with the community,” said Gwen Moore, Manager of Services

Adelaide Central Mission believes that there are 4 priority actions that must be implemented promptly:

1.   Urgent redirection of funds to community services that support people with mental illnesses.

2.   Security of tenure for people living in boarding houses and supported residential facilities. The residential tenancies act needs to protect the rights of individuals who live in daily or weekly rented accommodation to ensure that they have increased rights to tenure and appropriate levels of notice.

3.   Further changes to the residential tenancies act are needed in order to protect the individuals right of access to their rented accommodation at whatever time they desire it.  That is that providers of boarding houses and supported residential facilities not be permitted to “lock out” tenants at times during the day.

4.    Changes are also needed to Community Aged Care package guidelines to enable access to funded care for younger people with disabilities who live within congregate care facilities such as boarding houses and Supported Residential Care Facilities.

5.    A method is needed that sets a maximum weekly fee for accommodation for people with disabilities who live in boarding houses, supported Residential facilities in order to ensure that individuals have discretionary funds, to meet the other costs of living

                                   

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