Supported Housing for Homeless Persons - Research Paper Example

PROJECT HOMELESSNESS AT HAMPSHIRE UNITED KINGDOM Contents Contents 2 Causes of homelessness in elderly community at Hampshire 3 Economic factor 3 Social factor 4 Mental and physical disabilities 6 Lack of Government initiatives 8 References 9 Causes of homelessness in elderly community at Hampshire Hampshire is severely affected by the problem of homelessness in elderly community. This problem is increasing day by day. Elderly community of UK is strongly affected by the problem of homelessness. Increase in homelessness of elder people is creating many problems in the society of UK. Different organizations are involved in handling this problem. They are taking care of elderly people and talking with their family members for reducing various factors which cause this problem. The factors causing homelessness in elderly community at Hampshire are as follows: Economic factor Presently UK is experiencing economic development. But cost of living in UK has significantly increased a lot. Price of various products and services are increasing day by day which create major problems in the daily life of UK people. A particular section of people earns good amount of money in UK. But most of the people face problems with their income level for maintaining healthy life. For this reason they are forced to leave their parents at their old age. Elder persons cannot contribute enough in earning money. They can bear their own expenses. That is why their children have to bear all their expenses which become problematic to them. Poverty UK has recently experienced major downfall in its economy. This economic downfall has created strong negative impacts on various things of its society. For this reason the pension amount of elder person has decreased a lot. As a result most of the elder person became financially incapable in living their lives and they have to depend on their children for money. This is not always perceived in a good way by the young people of Hampshire. This factor influences them to leave their parents (Clark and Rich, 2003). Unemployment Unemployment level is increasing at a high rate in Hampshire. As a result monetary problems are prevailing in the country. These problems are hampering the lives of people. Income options of Hampshire are becoming very narrow. For this reason the unemployment level is rising. This makes the people incapable of bearing the expenses of their parents. They are more focused on satisfying their own needs and demands with their limited amount of money (Crane and Warnes, 2000). Increasing House rent The cost of house or the house rent in Hampshire has increased a lot in past ten years. The elder persons of Hampshire cannot afford to pay huge amount of money for paying the rent of their houses or maintain their houses. Renting house has become major way of earning money by the people of Hampshire. For this reason they are raising the rents of their houses for earning more money. But this creates major problems for elder persons. In many instances this issue forces them to leave their house for saving money (Department of Human Services., 2002). Social factor Society of UK is modernizing day by day. Many new issues are affecting the society which is affecting the elder people negatively. Present the divorce rate is high in Hampshire which damages the family structure. Many of the modern trends of UK society are not accepted by old generations. They try to restrict their children in following those trends (Lipmann, 2002). This hampers their relationship with their children which results in the homelessness of old people. The young people leave their parents at a very early age for earning money or living their own life freely. Most of the people in this state become self dependent at a very early age (Odell and Commander, 2000). For this reason they feel the urge to look after their parents. People of this society are very much concerned about money. Sometimes the importance of people is also judged by their money. So the people of this place do not want to spend money on something from which they won’t get any return. At the old age people are not very productive. This influences them to avoid elder people. It is one of the important causes of homelessness of elder people in Hampshire (Russel, 2002). Family breakdown The family structure in Hampshire has experienced significant changes. Globalization and liberalization has influenced the people of UK to relocate in other countries or other places of UK. As a result the young people get separated from their parents or from their families which causes breakdown of their family structures. At the old age the senior people of a family are left along by the young family members (Sullivan and Koegel, 2000). This influences the elder people to leave their house. Families residing Hampshire do not have strong emotional bonding among the members. The elder people are avoided by most of the young members of a family. Most of the time in their family the senior persons feel neglected by their own people. This emotional reason forces them to leave their house (McKenzie, Pinger, and Kotecki, 2008). Physical abuse Elderly people of Hampshire sometimes become the victims of physical abuse. They are often ill treated by their near and dear ones. In many families young people give value to the elder person only to get their money. This often influences the young individuals to behave badly with senior persons. Sometimes they also get involved in physical hurting the elder people for fulfilling their needs and wants (Larimer, 2009). The problem of physical abuse of elder people is increasing rapidly in Hampshire. Many young people try to acquire the property of elder persons by making them the victim of physical abuse. Some old people have lost their lives for physical violence. The elder persons also face such situations where they have to leave their house for saving their lives. This causes the rise of homelessness in this country (Rosenheck, Kasprow, Frisman and Liu-Mares, 2003). Mental and physical disabilities At the old age the physical and mental ability and capability of people decreases. They become dependent on others. During old age most of the people become affected with different types of diseases. As a result their normal body functions get hampered. They require someone to assist them for performing daily activities. But the people of these countries lead a busy life (Votta, 2003). They do not have time to look after or assist the elder people. Young people are always busy with their own work. For this reason they get separated from elder people of their family by sending them to some places or by forcing them to leave the house. Most of the young people of Hampshire do not have enough money to keep attendant for elder people of their family. They also cannot bear the expenses of their old family member’s diseases. So to avoid such expenses they influence the elder people for becoming homeless (Wenzel, Koegel and Gelberg, 2000). Disease Many old people of Hampshire have become the victims of incurable diseases. Medical treatment has become very expensive in UK. Every person of Hampshire does not have the capacity to bear medical expenses of elder people. The salary which is earned by most of the people of this place only facilitates them in bearing the cost of limited medical expenses (United Nations Development Program, 2003). As a result the young generation of this place is not always capable of doing proper treatment of elder persons. This makes the condition sick old person more critical which negatively affects other family members (Thane, 2000). For making other members of the family safe the sick old people are forced to go out of their house. The sick old people are not perceived in a good by the people of Hampshire. Young people think them as a burden to society and also to their family. By doing treatment of elder people the young generation of Hampshire does not want to spend their money. So the old sick persons are left alone by others. This kind of behaviour by near and dear ones insist the elder people to leave their house (Mullins and Murie, 2006). Poor mental health At the old age the mental condition of maximum old people deteriorates. In many cases they do not realize the difference between real and virtual world. Sometimes they force their family members to work according to their ideas which are not practical enough to implement in real world. Poor mental health of old people increases the distance with young generation (Izuhara, 2000). The young people of Hampshire do not want to take responsibilities of old and mentally challenged persons. For poor mental health the old people sometimes behave badly with others which are not tolerated by the people of Hampshire (Hutson and Jones, 2002). They try to avoid this type of persons. This influences the old people to go away from their houses. Old people having mental problems do not get any job or recognition in the society. As a result they face problems in earning their livelihood in Hampshire. Therefore poor mental health also causes financial problems to elder people for which they are forced to go out from their houses (Nishizawa, 2000). Lack of Government initiatives The government of UK are not concerned about the increase in homelessness of elder people in Hampshire. There to no such strong legal rules and regulation implemented by the government for preventing this problem (Okamoto, 2007). The government is not taking any strong action for making the people of Hampshire to understand the consequences of this problem. As a result the homelessness of elder people is increasing at a high rate in Hampshire. References Clark, C. and Rich, A. R., 2003. Outcomes of homeless adults with mental illness in a housing program and in case management only. Psychiatric services, 54(1), pp. 78-83. Crane, M. and Warnes, A.M., 2000. Lessons From Lancefield Street: Tackling the Needs of Older Homeless People. London: Homeless Link. Department of Human Services., 2002. Summary of Housing Assistance Programs 2001-02. Victoria: DHS. Hutson, S. and Jones, S., 2002. Community self-build for young homeless people: Problems and potential. Housing Studies. 17(4), pp 639–656. Izuhara, M., 2000. Changing family tradition: Housing choices and constraints for older people in Japan. Housing Studies. 15(1), pp 89–110. Larimer, et al., 2009. Health care and public service use and costs before and after provision of housing for chronically homeless persons with severe alcohol problems. 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