❓ The Minister acknowledges that people seeking emergency housing in WA were turned away due to lack of capacity in 2017-18. Specific dates and locations are withheld due to confidentiality, but regional data on unassisted requests is provided.
AnsweredQoN 4248Legislative Assembly
Asked
17 October 2018
Member
Portfolio
Child Protection; Women's Interests; Prevention of Family and Domestic Violence; Community Services
QuestionView source ↗
I refer to emergency housing in Western Australia, and ask: (a) whether at any time over the past 18 months anyone has been turned away due to lack of capacity: (i) if yes, please provide dates, numbers of individuals and the name and location of the emergency housing where this has occurred?
AnswerView source ↗
Answered
20 November 2018
Responded by
Minister for Child Protection; Women's Interests; Prevention of Family and Domestic Violence; Community Services
Response time
8 days
(a) Yes.
(i) The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare collects and releases data annually. The table below provides 2017-18 Australian Institute of Health and Welfare data for specialist homelessness services (crisis accommodation) contracted by the Department of Communities and the number of instances of requests for accommodation, where there was no accommodation available at the time of the request.
It should be noted, the total number of unassisted requests does not represent the total number of individuals requesting accommodation, as an individual may make multiple requests to different services. In addition, individuals may have been accommodated by the service at a later date, or accommodated by another service on that date.
People who could not be accommodated may have been provided with other support such as:
Region
2017-18
Metropolitan (including Peel)
9,353
Great Southern
63
Goldfields
133
Murchison
171
Pilbara
158
Southwest
527
East Kimberley
0
West Kimberley
35
Wheatbelt
98
Total
10,538
In relation to the name and location of specialist homelessness services where these instances occurred, due to the confidentiality provisions in Section 29 of the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare Act 1987 , the release of the individual agency information is not possible without the permission from the individual agencies themselves.
As this data is provided by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, the Department of Communities does not hold individual dates of when the instances occurred.
(i) The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare collects and releases data annually. The table below provides 2017-18 Australian Institute of Health and Welfare data for specialist homelessness services (crisis accommodation) contracted by the Department of Communities and the number of instances of requests for accommodation, where there was no accommodation available at the time of the request.
It should be noted, the total number of unassisted requests does not represent the total number of individuals requesting accommodation, as an individual may make multiple requests to different services. In addition, individuals may have been accommodated by the service at a later date, or accommodated by another service on that date.
People who could not be accommodated may have been provided with other support such as:
Region
2017-18
Metropolitan (including Peel)
9,353
Great Southern
63
Goldfields
133
Murchison
171
Pilbara
158
Southwest
527
East Kimberley
0
West Kimberley
35
Wheatbelt
98
Total
10,538
In relation to the name and location of specialist homelessness services where these instances occurred, due to the confidentiality provisions in Section 29 of the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare Act 1987 , the release of the individual agency information is not possible without the permission from the individual agencies themselves.
As this data is provided by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, the Department of Communities does not hold individual dates of when the instances occurred.
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