Women’s Open Space launched in Leicester

A new project has been launched in Leicester, aiming to gather the insights and boost involvement of women with experience of homelessness. This six month project is being delivered by Action Homeless, a key partner in the European End Street Homelessness Campaign, hosted by World Habitat.

The project, funded by World Habitat’s Innovation Fund, will deliver a series of Women’s Open Space events, and the grant will enable Action Homeless and their partner organisations to ensure that women’s real-life experiences and insights, which are so often unheard and marginalised, directly inform the development of services in Leicester.

Following successful pilot events, run as a partnership between Action Homeless and The Bridge, the Women’s Open Space will now become an established monthly group which sees women coming together to share experiences and benefit from peer support.

Learning and insight gathered at the events will be shared through networks, including Leicester’s Homelessness Charter and across different European cities so that the voices of women are heard by a wide range of people.

For further information about the Women’s Open Space events, please contact info@actionhomeless.org.uk

Mark Grant, CEO of Action Homeless said:

“This grant from the Innovation Fund is an important step in our progress towards providing better services for women affected by homelessness. We can only do this successfully by listening to women, understanding their experiences, and acting on what we hear.”

Patrick Duce, Programme Lead (Homelessness) at World Habitat, said:

“We are delighted to continue to support our European End Street Homeless Campaign partners in Leicester, to bring marginalised experiences of housing exclusion direct to the services that are working to end street homelessness in the city.

Too often services are delivered to people, not with them, and this grant will provide on-going space to include women’s experience of homelessness and peer support”