Reduced numbers of people living in emergency housing is nothing to celebrate, writes youth homelessness worker Aaron Hendry.

I remember the moment we had to tell one of our rangatahi that they would have to survive on the streets again that night. The feeling of anger, frustration, fear, failure.

It was almost made worse by how gracious she was. How understanding. How accepting. As if this was a completely normal thing. For a young woman to live on Queen Street.

We’d spent the day fighting for her at Work and Income, working to escalate her situation within MSD (the Ministry of Social Development). Trying to find a solution. Doing everything we could to avoid this outcome.

And yet, we had failed.

This wasn’t the result of an unfortunate event or a moment of poor practice on behalf of a Work and Income worker.

It was the direct result of the coalition government’s decision to restrict access to emergency housing. A decision that appears to have more to do with achieving a target (no matter the cost) than caring for some of the most vulnerable in our community.

Last August, along with making it harder for homeless people to get a roof over their heads, the government also introduced new obligations and created harsher consequences for people who couldn’t meet them, including a 13-week standdown during which they’re ineligible for emergency housing help.

It’s important to say upfront that the emergency housing system has always been ineffective. I’m one of many housing and human rights advocates who condemned the last government for not doing more to end emergency housing and provide a more appropriate alternative.

So when the coalition government speaks of the failure of emergency housing, they aren’t wrong. The current motel model has sustained homelessness and entrenched inequality. It has privatised what should have been a public service caring for our most vulnerable, funnelling millions of dollars of public money into the pockets of moteliers, who’ve been allowed to make exorbitant profits while extracting profit from the provision of poor, inhumane and in some cases unliveable shelter for some of our most vulnerable people.

The Labour government didn’t do enough to address this. Moteliers made millions, while our people were forced to live in uninhabitable conditions, experiencing significant harm to their physical, mental and emotional health, with many people becoming trapped in a cycle of poverty and homelessness.

When the National-led coalition government came to power, they promised to address this. Chris Bishop stated boldly that emergency housing was one of “the biggest public policy failures in New Zealand history” and declared that the government was going to “end the blight that is emergency housing”.

But instead of building an alternative model to support people in immediate housing need, they essentially chose to close the door, leaving some of our most vulnerable people outside in the cold.

The official position is that everyone who needs access to shelter should be able to get it. MSD will tell you that emergency housing is not ideal for young people, so their focus is on supporting young people to access transitional housing and explore all other available options before granting emergency housing.

And despite widespread concern from those serving our unhoused whānau that people are being denied shelter and left to live on the street, the housing minister Tama Potaka continues to state that anyone who’s in genuine need can still access shelter through emergency housing.

The reality is completely different.

I lead Kick Back, a youth development organisation focused on responding to youth homelessness. One of our central services is The Front Door on Karangahape Road (K Road) in the Tāmaki city centre. It’s an outreach and early response hub for tamariki and rangatahi experiencing homelessness.

Aaron and team at Kick Back, a youth homelessness support service on K Road. (Photo supplied)

We’re a relatively new organisation, and yet the government’s changes have been particularly  jarring for me.

Not long ago, we had a young wahine walk into The Front Door in need of shelter. She’d spent the night on the street due to circumstances beyond her control. And she was terrified.

We supported her to walk into Work and Income, where she was immediately denied emergency housing. We were told that they could provide support for assessments and referrals to transitional housing, but nothing could be done that night. We spent hours advocating for a solution, and eventually, she was referred to a lodge.

However, the rooms she was offered at the lodge were small, dark and dirty. One of the rooms was filled with paint fumes after recently being repainted. When she arrived, she learned that the facilities were shared and that the other occupants were mostly single males transitioning from the justice system. As a vulnerable young wahine, she realised she would feel safer sleeping on the street with her friend than living in the lodge alone.

By the time she had viewed the lodge, Work and Income had closed, and it was too late to advocate for further solutions. She was terrified of sleeping on the street. But, staying at that lodge alone, in those conditions, scared her more.

She slept rough again that night.

I’ve served our rangatahi for more than a decade, caring and advocating for our rangatahi without shelter.

Rangatahi have always faced discrimination when seeking shelter from Work and Income. But one thing that gave advocates some leverage was a rule that obligated MSD to grant shelter “if denying Emergency Housing would put the young person at significant risk of harm”.

This rule has now been removed as part of the coalition government’s changes to emergency housing. And with its removal, access to shelter has become increasingly difficult for people. If you are experiencing homelessness and you have no shelter tonight, there is no guarantee that you will be able to get a roof over your head.

Another rangatahi who we supported recently was denied emergency housing because he wasn’t able to meet the new obligations the government has set for him. Mostly, this was because, as a child experiencing homelessness, he’d suffered significant trauma, was mentally and physically unwell, and was struggling to cope.

He’d made some poor decisions, resulting in MSD deciding to revoke his access to emergency housing.

As a result, he was forced back on the street.

When we talk about youth homelessness, I worry that people don’t understand how dangerous the consequences of being without shelter are.

On the street, rangatahi are at risk of sexual assault, physical abuse, and exploitation. Sleeping rough can have a detrimental impact on a rangatahi’s physical and mental health, putting them at increased risk of suicide and worsening physical health.

In this case, despite multiple agencies advocating for a humane solution that didn’t involve a child sleeping on the street, he was denied access to emergency housing for weeks. During that period, we watched his mental health continue to decline. He was forced to move constantly, trying to stay awake at night to avoid being attacked in his sleep, coming into The Front Door during the day to sleep where he knew he would be safe.

Eventually, a vacancy in transitional housing became available. But not before he’d suffered significant harm as a result of the government’s choice to “tighten the gateway” into emergency housing.

I fear that the shape and state of youth homelessness is reaching levels I haven’t seen since before 2018 when youth homelessness was mostly being ignored. It wasn’t unusual back then to find groups of rangatahi sleeping rough on the streets, in parks, in the bush, and there were no real options available to provide immediate housing and support for them.

Between 2018 and 2020, the use of motels as emergency housing became more common as the government was forced to confront the reality of homelessness in Aotearoa. Yet, young people were still routinely discriminated against and denied access to shelter because many moteliers refused to support people under 18.

Then Covid happened. Some of you will remember the celebratory headlines about how New Zealand had “ended homelessness”. Of course, the reality was different. Our adult whānau were shoved into motels, hostels and lodges, while our young people continued to be denied shelter — forced to live in graveyards, under bridges, on our streets. I remember coming out of that first lockdown and meeting rangatahi on K Road. While many of us were safely locked down in our homes, they had been locked out.

It was after that first lockdown that things slowly began to change. Thanks to significant collective advocacy from organisations serving young people across the country, access to emergency housing became more available to young people. We still had to fight to get them shelter, but more often than not, we found a way through.

And now the coalition government has shut the door.

It’s hard to adequately convey the absolute horror of what is happening to our rangatahi as a result of this policy. People are getting hurt.

There are nights when my team and I go home, not knowing if the young person we left on K Road will live to see tomorrow. When I fear that this will be the night they lose hope, or end up in the wrong place at the wrong time with life-threatening consequences.

It’s important to understand that youth homelessness doesn’t have to exist.

It’s a choice.

A choice to pay for tax cuts for our landlords and the rich by siphoning money out of services that our most vulnerable people in New Zealand need to survive.

A choice to artificially manufacture a drop in emergency housing numbers so the government can sell the political narrative that they “get things done!”

A choice to leave our most vulnerable kids on the street.

We can make different choices.

We can choose to build an Aotearoa where all our people have access to their basic human needs. Where all our children are housed, safe, and provided with the dignity and care they truly deserve.

An Aotearoa where no child is abandoned to sleep on our streets.

Aaron Hendry (tangata Tiriti) is a youth development worker and rangatahi advocate. He  co-founded and leads Kick Back with his wife Summer and whānau, an organisation responding to youth homelessness. 

E-Tangata, 2024