November 17, 2022 • 11 mins
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Listen alive at Tasmania talks dot com dot AU. Well
a UK, they've actually been warned that there's a recession
coming the UK. Actually, some are saying they're in recession
at the moment and people should prepare for the biggest
drop in living standards in living memory, which is all
very scary here in Australia. We're not sure where it's
(00:21):
all going. But on the phone right now, Heather Kent.
She's the chief executive officer of Saint Vincent de Paul
get A.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Heather, Hi, how are you.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
I'm well. Are you've seeing lots more people come through
your doors who are struggling?
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Yeah, yep, we absolutely are. And this has been going
on for some time now. I'm sure that won't surprise you,
but the numbers continue to escalate and that's what concerns
us most, especially because many of us in the community
are starting to think ahead to Christmas only a few
short weeks away. I'm very excited about that, but for
too many in our community it's a time of stress
and way.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
What are the some of the stories you're hearing from
people coming in? Are there people already losing their houses
or is that still to come.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Yeah, Look, there are people who are making significant changes
in an endeavor not to lose their house. They're making
choices that none of us should have to make. When
we launched this appeal only a couple of days ago,
I met with Kerry. She's a young mum, she's got
four kids. She's recently had her rental increase even further,
it's now at nine hundred. And when she sat down
(01:22):
with our Vini's members and started to figure out budgeting
and how she could service that, and the cost of
gas that she's got for her accommodation, which is rising
as well, she comes down to about twenty three dollars
a week to get by on. And when you've got
four kids, that doesn't offer a lot of joy or hope.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
I would reckon it can't be done, Can it can't
be Yeah?
Speaker 2 (01:42):
You're absolutely right. Yeah. So our purpose is to provide hope,
to provide support, and to serve people in our community
who need this support.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
Right now, I think it's going to get worse before
it gets better. When you said nine hundred dollars, you're
talking nine hundred dollars a month for.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
The rent fortnight, oh, fortnite?
Speaker 1 (02:03):
Okay, yep, yep.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Yeah. So for a young mum, we four kids, that's
a hell of a lot of money. It's a two
bedroom place. She's really doing it tough. Her kids have
been unwell. We've had quite a cold snap and we
had a few lovely warm days last week, but they've
become unwell and so then there's the cost of medication,
the fact that they have to miss school, the role
on effects, all the ripples that go through. That's what
(02:27):
our members are seeing every day.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
You do other things too. You don't just raise money
for by selling things. You've also got financial counseling for
people that I guess, like, like the lady you're just
talking about carry I think you said, yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
Yeah, that's right. So we offer financial counseling, so supporting budgeting.
We provide connections. I guess that's probably a really powerful
thing that Benni's does. It's a connector in helping people
to know where should they step to next for further support.
But we do provide emergency relief with food carts and
pure cards and meals out of our pantry basic items.
(03:02):
We did a foodbind drive kind about two months ago now,
and the response to that was enormous. It was people
just putting a few staple items in the shopping trolley
when they head on off and bringing them into to
Vinnis That went brilliantly well, But can I say we
need more support? Is just enormous.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
Gosh, Well, how many people a day would come through
your doors asking for help? Is that a question that
you can answer? I don't think you're probably.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
Could, so, yes, I could, because we do keep records,
But I couldn't tell you off the top of my head.
What I can say is that we sat down and
did the sum for the kind of support that we
provided over the course of the last year. We're about
to have our owner report released as many organizations suit,
and it tipped just over a million dollars of support.
So that's the hell of a lot of need that
occurs in ourcuity.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
When things start to go pair shaped in an economy,
domestic violence always seems to raise its head. You're seeing
is that going up in the currency?
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Yeah. So we have managers in each of our regents
who work with the vinnie members and they provide me
with a report on what's occurring. I joined Vinnie's two
months ago and it's been sobering, concerning and a reminder
of what is really appearing in corners of our community
(04:21):
that often goes unhurt, and what other members of the
community who might find themselves in a more fortunate position.
We're all experiencing the precious of cost of living, but
it's important to just pause and remind ourselves of what
others might be going through and how it can help.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
Would you say that it's worse than you expected?
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Yes, yes, it would, I think so. I've had quite
a lot to do with Vinnie's, Tasmine or other many
many years. I often work late in the Lonnie office
and it's about the time when the Vinny's Band volunteers
come back in in the evening, and I love to
have a chat with our volunteers, and can I say
we need more of those focus as well to understand
(05:02):
more about their experience on the streets in the evenings.
They're telling me that they're meeting people who are sometimes employed,
sometimes they're working several jobs, they have kids, they have families,
and they're just finding that they can't cope. So we
know that our Vinie bands offer an important array of
service in a variety of way. So it provides food,
(05:24):
their foods, the sandwiches. You know that some folks take
the sandwiches so that their kids have got school lunches
the next day.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
Oh okay, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
They're just basic items, you know, even personal hygiene items,
small items of clothing. It's often where that connection is made,
where we can begin to provide further support and really
scaffold them with all of the elements that they need.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
The homeless situation, at least I can talk in Tasmania.
It's probably the same across There's probably worse in some areas.
I'd reckon, but a lot of the people now that
are finding themselves homeless, and not the traditional homeless people
are they These are people that are, as you say, working,
they're going to school. I knew of one lady with
kids living in a car and somehow she was still
working and they were still going to UNI and no
(06:08):
one would have known that they were living in a car,
but they were somehow living in a car. Do you
hear those stories a lot?
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Yeah, we do, Yeah, and count Firfink is very common.
There's a growing cohort of older women as well. These
are often women who, let's say they're still relative when
I say older, but you know, they might be about
sixty and the kids have grown up and become independent,
and you know, during that woman's life, she's probably had
(06:37):
some time out of work in order to raise those kids.
Her superanuation hasn't been as well developed as perhaps others.
And suddenly she finds herself in a situation where we
rise in demand. Rent's gone up, costs, everything has gone up,
and suddenly, at a point in life where she thought,
you know, things might be looking sweet, she doesn't want
to turn to her kids and say, you know, can
(06:58):
I come and stay with you? These are human dignity
elements where people that you would not accept as finding
themselves in extreme challenge.
Speaker 1 (07:07):
If you're on the pension now and you have no
super it's virtually impossible to pay rent.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
Isn't it correct?
Speaker 1 (07:13):
That's just impossible. What should the government to be doing.
The government have to do more, and they have to
do something very short term. Whenever they talk about housing
us talking to Rogie Yinsch the other day, and whenever
they start talking about the homeless problem, they always start
the sentence has to contain months at the least, and
probably years, sometimes decades they don't seem to understand that
(07:34):
this is actually happening right now.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
Yeah, and you are right, it's multi faceted. There's no
quick fix. I wish there was, and that's where organizations
like Vinnies do provide that immediate relief wherever we can.
A large part of our focus is, however, on advocacy.
I joined with each of the other Binny Society CEOs
up in Canberra a couple of weeks ago and we
(07:58):
were working hard to increase the voice of those who
need to be heard in federal politics. But it's not
just a federal politics level. Obviously, we hear a great
deal about the Homes Tasmania legislation that's come through the
commitment to building ten thousand new homes in the next
ten years. But even at local government looking at planning approvals.
Speaker 1 (08:20):
Yeah, it's just taking too long. They need something sure term,
even if it's just pods somewhere that are just temporary.
That's what they need. It's going to happen straight away.
But no one understands that is I know. Yeah, so
you can say it now, you tell the government exactly
what they should be doing.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
Go on, well, yep, turn their mind to those immediate solutions.
Be novel, be innovative, look at what can be done now.
I would urge residents who might be concerned about what's
popping up next to them to avoid that. Not in
my backyard philosophy, we do find that that is a
resistor for many when things are set to go. Often
(08:57):
that's where they get closed down. Conversation with a container
company only in the last few days because we use
some name them up Royal Wolf containers for emergency crisis accommodation.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
Somebody suggested that a couple of years ago, and no
one listened. No one listened.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
Yeah, there's a few who have so, yeah, we've got
eighteen of them. We're looking yeah, so and they are
fully kitted out, they've got a small bathroom, they're ventilated
so that they are offering dignified living and we're looking
at expanding that concept. That's the conversation that I've been
having with row a Wolf in the last few days.
And of course then we need to say to state government, okay,
(09:36):
here's a solution. Yes it's short term. We know it's
not ideal, but we know that our men who live
at Bethlehem House in Hobart. There are twenty five bits
of them at our old Bethlehem house and there are
eighteen pods, and by and large day should prefer to
live in the pods. We've managed to fit them out
with support and we are working with state government on
this initiative. It's an area that we'd like to see
(09:56):
far more action.
Speaker 1 (09:57):
All right, you need money to do this. Let's get
into this that's happening right now. How can people be
a part of that?
Speaker 2 (10:02):
Yep, Okay, you're absolutely right. We do need everybody to
think about what they can do to assistance. We know
we're all doing it tough, but we're aiming to raise
two hundred and fifty thousand dollars between now and Christmas.
It's big part of that. We've done it before and
we know that if everybody really thinks about it and
does what they can to help, that'll make a difference.
So our website, Bennie's tares dot org dat au or
(10:24):
we've got a phone hotline that we really hope is
going to be going crazy, and that's simply thirteen eighteen twelve.
I would add one final one, a partnership that we've
just established with Ida we'll start kicking on the first
of December and in their eighty six stores across Tasmania
they'll have a little item there posting a little bar
coach scan beside every register. So consider popping into you
(10:47):
like le Ita as well and doing what you can
to support it.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
Do everything you can. Okay, what was that webpage again before?
I sagabye.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
Yep, Biddy's tares dot org dot au.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
That's an easy one, isn't it. Heather Camp, Chief Executive Office.
A two hundred and fifty grand needed before the before Christmas.
Good luck, hope it's all going to happen. Talk to
you very soon.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
Thanks again, Take care.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
This is tans Talk. Listen live at Tasmania Talks dot
com dot au.
Listen alive at Tasmania talks dot com dot AU. Well
a UK, they've actually been warned that there's a recession
coming the UK. Actually, some are saying they're in recession
at the moment and people should prepare for the biggest
drop in living standards in living memory, which is all
very scary here in Australia. We're not sure where it's
(00:21):
all going. But on the phone right now, Heather Kent.
She's the chief executive officer of Saint Vincent de Paul
get A.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Heather, Hi, how are you.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
I'm well. Are you've seeing lots more people come through
your doors who are struggling?
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Yeah, yep, we absolutely are. And this has been going
on for some time now. I'm sure that won't surprise you,
but the numbers continue to escalate and that's what concerns
us most, especially because many of us in the community
are starting to think ahead to Christmas only a few
short weeks away. I'm very excited about that, but for
too many in our community it's a time of stress
and way.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
What are the some of the stories you're hearing from
people coming in? Are there people already losing their houses
or is that still to come.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Yeah, Look, there are people who are making significant changes
in an endeavor not to lose their house. They're making
choices that none of us should have to make. When
we launched this appeal only a couple of days ago,
I met with Kerry. She's a young mum, she's got
four kids. She's recently had her rental increase even further,
it's now at nine hundred. And when she sat down
(01:22):
with our Vini's members and started to figure out budgeting
and how she could service that, and the cost of
gas that she's got for her accommodation, which is rising
as well, she comes down to about twenty three dollars
a week to get by on. And when you've got
four kids, that doesn't offer a lot of joy or hope.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
I would reckon it can't be done, Can it can't
be Yeah?
Speaker 2 (01:42):
You're absolutely right. Yeah. So our purpose is to provide hope,
to provide support, and to serve people in our community
who need this support.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
Right now, I think it's going to get worse before
it gets better. When you said nine hundred dollars, you're
talking nine hundred dollars a month for.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
The rent fortnight, oh, fortnite?
Speaker 1 (02:03):
Okay, yep, yep.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Yeah. So for a young mum, we four kids, that's
a hell of a lot of money. It's a two
bedroom place. She's really doing it tough. Her kids have
been unwell. We've had quite a cold snap and we
had a few lovely warm days last week, but they've
become unwell and so then there's the cost of medication,
the fact that they have to miss school, the role
on effects, all the ripples that go through. That's what
(02:27):
our members are seeing every day.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
You do other things too. You don't just raise money
for by selling things. You've also got financial counseling for
people that I guess, like, like the lady you're just
talking about carry I think you said, yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
Yeah, that's right. So we offer financial counseling, so supporting budgeting.
We provide connections. I guess that's probably a really powerful
thing that Benni's does. It's a connector in helping people
to know where should they step to next for further support.
But we do provide emergency relief with food carts and
pure cards and meals out of our pantry basic items.
(03:02):
We did a foodbind drive kind about two months ago now,
and the response to that was enormous. It was people
just putting a few staple items in the shopping trolley
when they head on off and bringing them into to
Vinnis That went brilliantly well, But can I say we
need more support? Is just enormous.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
Gosh, Well, how many people a day would come through
your doors asking for help? Is that a question that
you can answer? I don't think you're probably.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
Could, so, yes, I could, because we do keep records,
But I couldn't tell you off the top of my head.
What I can say is that we sat down and
did the sum for the kind of support that we
provided over the course of the last year. We're about
to have our owner report released as many organizations suit,
and it tipped just over a million dollars of support.
So that's the hell of a lot of need that
occurs in ourcuity.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
When things start to go pair shaped in an economy,
domestic violence always seems to raise its head. You're seeing
is that going up in the currency?
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Yeah. So we have managers in each of our regents
who work with the vinnie members and they provide me
with a report on what's occurring. I joined Vinnie's two
months ago and it's been sobering, concerning and a reminder
of what is really appearing in corners of our community
(04:21):
that often goes unhurt, and what other members of the
community who might find themselves in a more fortunate position.
We're all experiencing the precious of cost of living, but
it's important to just pause and remind ourselves of what
others might be going through and how it can help.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
Would you say that it's worse than you expected?
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Yes, yes, it would, I think so. I've had quite
a lot to do with Vinnie's, Tasmine or other many
many years. I often work late in the Lonnie office
and it's about the time when the Vinny's Band volunteers
come back in in the evening, and I love to
have a chat with our volunteers, and can I say
we need more of those focus as well to understand
(05:02):
more about their experience on the streets in the evenings.
They're telling me that they're meeting people who are sometimes employed,
sometimes they're working several jobs, they have kids, they have families,
and they're just finding that they can't cope. So we
know that our Vinie bands offer an important array of
service in a variety of way. So it provides food,
(05:24):
their foods, the sandwiches. You know that some folks take
the sandwiches so that their kids have got school lunches
the next day.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
Oh okay, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
They're just basic items, you know, even personal hygiene items,
small items of clothing. It's often where that connection is made,
where we can begin to provide further support and really
scaffold them with all of the elements that they need.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
The homeless situation, at least I can talk in Tasmania.
It's probably the same across There's probably worse in some areas.
I'd reckon, but a lot of the people now that
are finding themselves homeless, and not the traditional homeless people
are they These are people that are, as you say, working,
they're going to school. I knew of one lady with
kids living in a car and somehow she was still
working and they were still going to UNI and no
(06:08):
one would have known that they were living in a car,
but they were somehow living in a car. Do you
hear those stories a lot?
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Yeah, we do, Yeah, and count Firfink is very common.
There's a growing cohort of older women as well. These
are often women who, let's say they're still relative when
I say older, but you know, they might be about
sixty and the kids have grown up and become independent,
and you know, during that woman's life, she's probably had
(06:37):
some time out of work in order to raise those kids.
Her superanuation hasn't been as well developed as perhaps others.
And suddenly she finds herself in a situation where we
rise in demand. Rent's gone up, costs, everything has gone up,
and suddenly, at a point in life where she thought,
you know, things might be looking sweet, she doesn't want
to turn to her kids and say, you know, can
(06:58):
I come and stay with you? These are human dignity
elements where people that you would not accept as finding
themselves in extreme challenge.
Speaker 1 (07:07):
If you're on the pension now and you have no
super it's virtually impossible to pay rent.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
Isn't it correct?
Speaker 1 (07:13):
That's just impossible. What should the government to be doing.
The government have to do more, and they have to
do something very short term. Whenever they talk about housing
us talking to Rogie Yinsch the other day, and whenever
they start talking about the homeless problem, they always start
the sentence has to contain months at the least, and
probably years, sometimes decades they don't seem to understand that
(07:34):
this is actually happening right now.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
Yeah, and you are right, it's multi faceted. There's no
quick fix. I wish there was, and that's where organizations
like Vinnies do provide that immediate relief wherever we can.
A large part of our focus is, however, on advocacy.
I joined with each of the other Binny Society CEOs
up in Canberra a couple of weeks ago and we
(07:58):
were working hard to increase the voice of those who
need to be heard in federal politics. But it's not
just a federal politics level. Obviously, we hear a great
deal about the Homes Tasmania legislation that's come through the
commitment to building ten thousand new homes in the next
ten years. But even at local government looking at planning approvals.
Speaker 1 (08:20):
Yeah, it's just taking too long. They need something sure term,
even if it's just pods somewhere that are just temporary.
That's what they need. It's going to happen straight away.
But no one understands that is I know. Yeah, so
you can say it now, you tell the government exactly
what they should be doing.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
Go on, well, yep, turn their mind to those immediate solutions.
Be novel, be innovative, look at what can be done now.
I would urge residents who might be concerned about what's
popping up next to them to avoid that. Not in
my backyard philosophy, we do find that that is a
resistor for many when things are set to go. Often
(08:57):
that's where they get closed down. Conversation with a container
company only in the last few days because we use
some name them up Royal Wolf containers for emergency crisis accommodation.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
Somebody suggested that a couple of years ago, and no
one listened. No one listened.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
Yeah, there's a few who have so, yeah, we've got
eighteen of them. We're looking yeah, so and they are
fully kitted out, they've got a small bathroom, they're ventilated
so that they are offering dignified living and we're looking
at expanding that concept. That's the conversation that I've been
having with row a Wolf in the last few days.
And of course then we need to say to state government, okay,
(09:36):
here's a solution. Yes it's short term. We know it's
not ideal, but we know that our men who live
at Bethlehem House in Hobart. There are twenty five bits
of them at our old Bethlehem house and there are
eighteen pods, and by and large day should prefer to
live in the pods. We've managed to fit them out
with support and we are working with state government on
this initiative. It's an area that we'd like to see
(09:56):
far more action.
Speaker 1 (09:57):
All right, you need money to do this. Let's get
into this that's happening right now. How can people be
a part of that?
Speaker 2 (10:02):
Yep, Okay, you're absolutely right. We do need everybody to
think about what they can do to assistance. We know
we're all doing it tough, but we're aiming to raise
two hundred and fifty thousand dollars between now and Christmas.
It's big part of that. We've done it before and
we know that if everybody really thinks about it and
does what they can to help, that'll make a difference.
So our website, Bennie's tares dot org dat au or
(10:24):
we've got a phone hotline that we really hope is
going to be going crazy, and that's simply thirteen eighteen twelve.
I would add one final one, a partnership that we've
just established with Ida we'll start kicking on the first
of December and in their eighty six stores across Tasmania
they'll have a little item there posting a little bar
coach scan beside every register. So consider popping into you
(10:47):
like le Ita as well and doing what you can
to support it.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
Do everything you can. Okay, what was that webpage again before?
I sagabye.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
Yep, Biddy's tares dot org dot au.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
That's an easy one, isn't it. Heather Camp, Chief Executive Office.
A two hundred and fifty grand needed before the before Christmas.
Good luck, hope it's all going to happen. Talk to
you very soon.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
Thanks again, Take care.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
This is tans Talk. Listen live at Tasmania Talks dot
com dot au.
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