Councils are turning away survivors of domestic abuse and their children, forcing them to sleep rough, a report by Women’s Aid has claimed.
One in ten women from the charity’s No Woman Turned Away project, which covered 264 women, was forced to sleep rough. Of those, three were pregnant and five had children with them.
Of the 97 women who approached their local housing team for support, over half were prevented from making a valid homeless application and were refused assistance with emergency accommodation.
Women’s Aid said housing teams are failing in their statutory duty to assist those in priority need and vulnerable.
Chief executive of Women’s Aid, Katie Ghose said: ‘Statutory agencies need to stop putting obstacles in the way of women fleeing domestic abuse and start supporting them to safety.
‘It is no wonder that women and their children who are literally fleeing for their lives end up sleeping rough or returning to an abusive partner if they are turned away from services who should be helping them.’
She added: ‘We’re calling on the Government to give survivors a cast-iron guarantee that their dangerous planned changes to how refuges will be funded are firmly off the table and that refuges will be protected.’
The project report, Nowhere to Turn says just one in five women found a suitable refuge, while nearly one in ten was forced to stay with their abuser.
Women’s Aid has called for specialist training in domestic abuse for local authority housing staff.
