Practice blog

24th August 2017

Briony Williamson on why young people's support workers are so vital

This is the second part of an interview in which Briony Williamson talks about the importance of young people's support workers. In Autumn Briony will be delivering the training Responding to young people affected by domestic abuse.

Briony has been working in the Learning and Accreditation team at SafeLives for nearly five years, training on our Idva, young people’s practitioner and outreach worker’s courses.

Briony, anyone who’s met you will know what a passionate advocate for youth work you are. Can you tell us what sparked your interest in this area?

Before I came to SafeLives I worked for a domestic abuse service as an Idva, an Outreach worker and pretty much every other role going! I also worked at my local youth service in the evenings and I guess that is where my passion for working with young people really started. I had worked in mental health with a lot of adolescent clients prior to that, which probably sowed the seed, but youth work felt like an opportunity to really support young people in a way that they wanted.

Why do you think that is?

Because it’s outside of formal education you can talk to young people about what they want to talk about. You can do the activities that they want to do and talk about the subjects that they are interested in. A big part of my role was talking about healthy relationships - signposting young people to family planning services, handing out condoms and things like that. I got to see a side of young people that I would not have seen if I’d been working in a more formal, school-based setting.

Unfortunately it didn’t take long before I was hearing about relationships that were definitely not healthy. I was seeing controlling behaviours between people as young as 12. It would have been their first relationship and I was witnessing first-hand how that impacted on them - especially the young women.

I was genuinely shocked by the things they thought they should do or put up with. That they found these things acceptable or even expected them in a relationship at such a crucial age was upsetting. And then add to that the possibility these experiences could be setting them up to become repeat victims… It made me really want to take what I was learning from my work at the domestic abuse centre and bring it to work in the youth centre. I was able to do that by tapping into various healthy relationships work and young women’s groups.

You joined SafeLives five years ago. Do you think the domestic abuse sector has changed in that time?

I think when I first came to work in the DA sector - which was over ten years ago now - we had a different government and different priorities. I came into a service where there were Idvas, outreach workers, children’s workers, refuge, drop-in centres. It was a fully-tiered service that allowed for people to be high risk and when their safety improved they would receive long-term support and see their children being supported. And it really made a difference.

The feedback we got from clients was that these services really helped them at a time they needed it. The Idva kept them safe in the first instance but it was the ongoing support that kept them safe longer term. Sadly it feels that following budget cuts we are losing some of that in parts of the sector now.

You’ve continued your work around supporting young people since joining SafeLives five years ago. Can you tell me about that?

When I first joined SafeLives I worked on the Young People’s Programme and the Working with Gang-Affected Young People’s course. It was an absolute privilege to work with those people. It’s a very special sort of person who wants to work with young people that are experiencing domestic abuse, or are in an abusive relationship, or involved in gangs, because they’ve often had personal experience themselves or via a family member or friend that has been affected.

The drive to do this sort of work - often for very little or any financial gain - is nothing short of amazing. And a lot of them are doing it in a voluntary capacity because it’s not seen as something that should be a high profile paid role. And yet these roles are crucial. It’s the same as Outreach... Idva definitely has the high profile and people understand it, but sometimes these other roles are assumed to be less important, when they’re not.

Young people’s support workers and outreach workers support people to recover, rebuild and reflect, and this enables them to make the necessary changes to go on to have healthy relationships in the future. The Idva role is vital but so are these roles that run alongside it.

This year you’re delivering SafeLives training for practitioners working with young people. What can you tell us about this course?

I’m really pleased to be delivering the Responding to young people's course because by doing this we are saying that young people’s relationships, and consequently, young people’s relationship abuse is important. Too often it feels like it’s been ignored, minimised or swept under the carpet by adults who think ‘it wasn’t important when I was a young person so it’s not important now… that’s just how it is’. We need to change that. It’s not how it should be and it can be different.

After all, one day these young people will become adults and they will be making decisions about the next generation of young people coming through.

For more information:

Stay in touch:

SafeLives is on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Email
SafeLives Community is a free platform for professionals to connect, share good practice, ask our experts and access exclusive content

Tags:

children

young people

training

By Kate

21st August 2017

The unique and vital role of the Housing Idva

Claire Karslake is a Housing Idva for Splitz Places of Safety Project, with over 10 years’ experience as an Idva. In this blog, she discusses the unique challenges of her role, and how she helps her clients to get the housing support they need. For an audio version of this blog, scroll down to the bottom of the page or visit our Soundcloud profile.

“My advice to housing providers is when a survivor of domestic abuse is sat in front of you, remember they are not ‘just a roof’. They are human beings with stories to tell, and unless you a have walked a mile in their shoes you have no idea of the unimaginable things they may have been through to get them here today”.

After 11 years as an Independent Domestic Violence Advisor (Idva), I’ve realised that our clients experiencing homelessness and domestic abuse need a different approach. They do not always get an empathetic response from the Housing service and are left questioning their decisions to leave and become safe. Relationships need to be built between our clients and Housing. Clients leaving and abusive partner are at their most vulnerable and they need wraparound support as well as crisis management and safety planning to reduce the DVA risk. Being rehoused does not mean that need comes to an end and the support offered needs to reflect this. Even more, emergency housing provision-such as refuge and B&B-doesn’t always provide a space for women and men with multiple and complex needs or older children.

Places of Safety was developed to respond to this gap in support and our response is two-fold:

First, we provide homes within the community that are a safe place where anyone can rebuild their lives free from violence and abuse. It’s a place where a client’s son who is over 16 can remain with their family, where male victims can bring their children to be safe, and where women and men with complex and multiple disadvantage can receive a service that recognises and responds to their needs. Our project’s aim is not to replace or replicate the vital work of refuges.

Second, Places of Safety provides a specific Housing Idva. This is me. My sole role is to support women and men who are experiencing possible homelessness alongside domestic violence and abuse. As a Housing Idva I have a much smaller caseload. This gives me the time and space to build relationships and provide holistic support, which is especially vital for individuals who are facing domestic abuse and homelessness alongside multiple and complex needs. I am able to go to appointments with my clients at housing, solicitors, the GP – wherever they feel they need support. It is also my job to work closely with the Housing Options team; to advocate for my clients, ensuring that Homeless applications are activated promptly and investigations are done promptly.

“As an Idva, my starting point is belief, and conveying this belief to other professionals is a major aim of my role’’

That is why another key element of my role is to give the Housing Options teams across the eight districts of Devon necessary training around domestic abuse risks and responses. It is essential that housing professionals better understand and respond to individuals’ experiences of domestic abuse amongst other needs and circumstances.

This is a very new project so we as yet have little evidence to provide. However, with just two current Places of Safety we have successfully and safely housed three families, helping 13 children. The feedback from our training has been good and we are hoping to really affect the culture within housing teams, helping them to see that they need to look at the person and not just the housing need.

My advice to housing providers is when a survivor of domestic abuse is sat in front of you remember they are ‘not just a roof. They are human beings with stories to tell, and unless you a have walked a mile in their shoes you have no idea of the unimaginable things they may have been through to get them here today. We need to move forward from looking at bed spaces to supporting and caring about the individual in order to affect change for the better.

About

Claire Karslake is a Housing Idva for Splitz Places of Safety Project. Claire has over 10 years’ experience as an Idva. Splitz has delivered services to people experiencing the trauma of domestic abuse since 1989. We are women and girl focussed with 85% of our referrals being female. We deliver a holistic, person-centered approach that is best placed to meet the varied needs of our community. We are committed to working with other agencies to deliver an integrated, coordinated, community response.

Keep up with the latest research, expert content and best practice from SafeLives

Tags:

spotlights

By Guest blogger

15th August 2017

What does it take to be an Outreach worker?

In this short video, our Head of Learning and Accreditation Jo Morrish explains how the role of Outreach worker can be different to that of an Idva in terms of the type of support offered to victims and survivors of domestic abuse.

More information

If you work in this field you may be interested in our Training for Outreach workers
Stay in touch - SafeLives on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Email...

Tags:

training

risk

By Kate

11th August 2017

Why a Gendered Approach to Supporting Women Experiencing Homelessness with Histories of Violence is Vital

Lisa Raftery is the London Development Manager at Homeless Link. In this blog she talks about the specific needs of women experiencing homelessness, and why a gender neutral approach often fails to support women. For an audio version of this blog, scroll to the bottom of the page or visit our Soundcloud profile.

“Women experiencing homelessness” conjures up many different images of women: women with children in refuge accommodation, living in homeless shelters, sofa-surfing, exchanging sex for a bed or sleeping rough on the streets.

These women, regardless of their exact situation, usually have one thing in common: violence. Estimates range between 44% - 89% of women who are homeless have also experienced violence either during or prior to becoming homeless. Violence during childhood and/or adulthood plays a significant role in how a woman is affected by homelessness. We also know, from St Mungo’s Rebuilding Shattered Lives report and work by AGENDA that these same women also report a range of other adverse childhood experiences that often extend well into adulthood.

With such wide experiences of violence and abuse contributing to women’s homelessness, many women also go on to develop mental health issues, PTSD and substance dependency falling into the multiple and complex needs category. Currently around 30% of people accessing homelessness services are women, and recent figures show that it’s just 12% for those sleeping rough. We know however that women sleep rough differently to men and will often be in “hidden” homeless situations, and therefore will not show up on official statistics. Yet, despite women’s unique and complex experience of homelessness, very few homelessness services are gender specific and responsive to women’s multiple disadvantages and needs.

Given the reduction in gender specialist services and limited refuge spaces for women with complex needs, we must ask how many of these women are able to access the support they need (see AVA's Case by Case report)? How can we evidence the need for gender specialist support to be systematically available to all women regardless of their level of need? And how do we recognise and respond to individual factors - such as violence and mental health, as well as structural factors - such as poverty, inequality and welfare cuts, which combine to contribute to women’s homelessness and put women more at risk?

Lana and Claire’s story highlights how the current system fails women with histories of abuse and subsequent complex needs. Through Expert Link they are able to share their experiences in the video below:

Lana and Claire’s respective stories highlight the failings of the current system to recognise the gendered nature of the abuse they have suffered, and how the effects of this abuse can manifest in multiple and complex needs such as substance misuse and mental health issues. Claire talks about how despite being provided accommodation due to her alcohol dependency, she was also evicted for that very same dependency. What could services have done differently to better support Claire? Fighting for and achieving gender equality is the most powerful way to ensure women are lifted out of poverty, and suffer less abuse, mental ill health, and homelessness. What more can services working with women experiencing homelessness and policy makers do alongside this to improve the support for women and prevent other women from becoming homeless?

Four key areas to consider:

A cross-sector, multi-agency response: Women’s services need to be linked in with homelessness services and vice versa. If you are a women’s centre or specialist VAWG service get in touch with your local homelessness services working with women and develop a relationship. A great example of this partnership approach is Brighton Women’s Centre and Worthing Churches Homelessness Project, where the homelessness project provide the accommodation and the Women’s Centre provide the gender specialist support.
Gender specific support: Men and women’s needs differ hugely, as do their routes into homelessness and it is clear that generic gender neutral support is not effective in supporting women experiencing violence and homelessness. Women need gender specialist support, and this needs to include both funding and skilling up of frontline practitioners.
Trauma informed approaches: Understanding what has happened to women instead of asking what is wrong with women, recognising why a woman is using substances and providing trauma informed responses to empower her with alternative coping strategies and the support she needs.
Safe and secure housing: A report by Gudrun Burnet from the Domestic Abuse and Housing Alliance (DAHA) highlights that safe secure housing is critical for women fleeing violence to rebuild control and emotional safety.

For more information about the work of Homeless Link and our work with the sectors to improve support to women experiencing homelessness please contact Lisa Raftery, London Development Manager at lisa.raftery@homelesslink.org.uk

Lisa Raftery, London Development Manager at Homeless Link has worked in the public and charitable sectors for 15 years firstly in central and local government commissioning a range of services including VAWG, homelessness and health services. Now for the charitable sector at Homeless Link delivering the Pan London Umbrella Support Project (PLUS) funded by London Councils to strengthen the London Homelessness Sector. Lisa is passionate about the issue of women's homelessness and the need for greater recognition and funding of gender specialist services, and through her work aims to encourage greater collaboration between the sectors to better support women experiencing homelessness.

Homeless Link is the national membership charity for the homelessness and supported housing sectors. We represent over 750 organisations, working to help them improve the support they offer to vulnerable people, and campaigning for policy change that will help end homelessness. We provide training and events, information, resources and one-to-one support on a range of policy and good practice issues, to improve the sustainability and outcomes of frontline services. We also lobby national and local decision makers to develop a favourable policy environment, increase funding, and drive change for the sector.

For more expert insight and practice tips around homelessness and domestic abuse, visit our Spotlight homepage

Tags:

spotlights

By Guest blogger

19th July 2017

Interview: SafeLives Trainer Briony Williamson on the importance of support workers for young people

Briony has been working in the Learning and Accreditation team at SafeLives for nearly five years, training on our Idva, young people’s practitioner and outreach worker’s courses.

This Autumn she will be delivering Responding to young people affected by domestic abuse: expert level and in this interview she talks about why we need to take young people's relationships seriously.

Our recent report Safe Young Lives on young people and domestic abuse highlighted the shocking fact that young people experience the highest rates of domestic abuse of any age group. Why do you think this is?

In part I think it’s because it is in anyone’s first relationship, at whatever age that happens, that they are at the highest risk of abuse. They are still learning what a relationship looks like and inevitably they are very vulnerable to somebody who might be controlling or abusive and mislead them about what a relationship should look like.

Secondly, young people have traditionally been treated as children and the severity of abuse in their relationships – in fact their relationships in general - has been underestimated or not taken seriously. Unfortunately a lot of practitioners’ approaches can reflect that. Things may be dismissed that we know from our work and our research are in fact very serious and mark the risk of harm as very high.

What advice in particular would you give to someone working with young people affected by abuse?

I think a common issue is that the vast majority of support workers - and I include myself in this - aren’t young people anymore! In fact, for many of us, when we were young people was quite a while ago, so our frames of reference are very different. A lot of professionals fall down by trying to be cool, by trying to act like they are on the same wavelength as the young person and that they understand exactly what life is like for them. But the reality is that we don’t.

Instead it’s important to learn how it’s possible to work with young people in a way that isn’t patronising or condescending but acknowledges the differences between you. You need to find a way for that young person to relate to you, trust you and work with you. By building that trust and working with them in a really respectful way, you can take steps to improve a young person’s safety. And by helping them understand what a healthy relationship should look like, you can support them to improve their future relationships too.

What do you think learners take away from the Responding to young people training?

The first 8 days of a foundation course forms the core training and covers all of the basic skills that we believe any practitioner should have. For example, how we relate to people, how we listen to people, needs and risk assessment, case management and so on. The expert course (and the final four days of the young people’s foundation course) builds on that learning to consider the specific issues relating to young people, for example how to effectively support gang affected young people, identifying and addressing honour-based abuse, FGM and forced marriage.

We talk about child sexual exploitation and we also focus a lot on the use of technology to abuse, which I think is an area of real concern for a lot of practitioners. We often hear people say that they don’t fully understand how the internet and apps can be used by an abusive person to control their partner, so we have built this into all of our training courses.

Technology is changing all the time. To what extent does the training reflect this?

The training is as up to date as it can be on the day. There are obviously new apps coming out all the time so we send practitioners away not only with the knowledge of what is available right now but also with access to resources so that they can stay informed beyond that point.

It’s the same with substance use. We can train you on this one day but whatever substance is the current ‘in’ thing will probably be different next month, so we aim to send practitioners out knowing the current information and also where they can find updates on a regular basis to keep themselves up to date.

You’re clearly very passionate about ensuring young people get the support they need. Can you explain why you believe it to be so important?

Since working with SafeLives, my main focus has been on the Idva programme but I’ve also worked on projects like the young people’s practitioner training and it’s made it really clear to me that this is where our work needs to start.

If we’re going to end domestic abuse, we have to start at the beginning. And in fact the beginning is even before these young people, but in this instance we are talking about young adults who, from when they start their first relationships in their teens, are starting a pattern that could run throughout the rest of their lives. So if we can work with them at this early stage, help them address the risks in their relationships, talk about what a healthy relationship is and explain what they should be able to expect, then we can begin to break that cycle.

And that’s why this course is so important to me because although Idva work is crucial, it cannot change anything in isolation and we need roles like young people’s support workers and outreach workers because they really can change lives.

More information

Tags:

children

young people

training

By Kate