20 November 2024

Hestia joined HRH Prince William and other organisations at an event organised by the Homewards Coalition in Newport to discuss approaches to preventing women’s homelessness in the city.

Homewards is a five-year, locally led programme launched by The Royal Foundation of The Prince and Princess of Wales, that aims to demonstrate that together it’s possible to end homelessness – making it rare, brief and unrepeated.

Women’s homelessness, and specifically women who face multiple disadvantages such as trauma, poverty and domestic abuse, have been identified as a key priority in Newport with reports of women’s homelessness rising in the city. Women are often more susceptible to experiencing ‘hidden homelessness’ compared to men, as they are less likely to rough sleep due to safety fears, resulting in sofa surfing, or sleeping on public transport. By focusing support specifically on women’s homelessness in Newport, Homewards aims to not only support these women but also share learnings with the programme’s other five flagship locations and beyond.

Hestia’s Safe Spaces provide a safe and discreet way for anyone experiencing domestic abuse to reach out to friends and family or contact specialist support services. Launched during the Covid-19 national lockdown as part of the national UK Says No More campaign, thousands of high street banks and pharmacies* across the UK are now signed up to the scheme.

Photography credit: The Royal Foundation

Alessia Bianco, Head of Domestic Abuse Prevention and Sexual Violence Prevention at Hestia attended the event. She commented:

“We know that women who experience domestic abuse are significantly impacted by homelessness and there are likely many more who are ‘hidden’ from official statistics. By providing safe routes to advice and specialist support for anyone experiencing domestic abuse, we aim to prevent women from finding themselves in a situation where they have to choose between staying with an abuser and homelessness.”

Patrick Ryan, Chief Executive at Hestia added:

“It is heartening that so many pharmacies and banks have already come on board to support the Safe Spaces scheme – but we really want to see all of the large retail banks offering a Safe Space on the high street. One in five of us will experience domestic abuse in our lifetime, so if we could reach more of the 150 million customers represented by the top five UK retail banks, we could give people the chance to find safety and ultimately prevent lives from being lost.”

*Current Safe Spaces partners include Boots, Co-operative Bank, HSBC, Metro Bank, Morrisons Pharmacies, Nationwide, NatWest Group, Santander, Superdrug,TSB and Swansea Building Society.