Help for female victims of violence needing a new home unpredictable

The attitudes of officials are determining what help battered women get when they need a new home. In the absence of national or municipal guidelines, these decisions are taken far down in the organisation, which means that the attitudes and knowledge of individual case officers or working groups have a major influence. A new report from the National Centre for Knowledge on Men’s Violence Against Women (NCK) reveals major differences between municipalities.

“There are municipalities in our study where affected women have not received help in finding their own housing, even though there are empty apartments. This is due to a lack of coordination between social services and the provision of housing. In one case, the municipal housing company arranged an apartment, but social services made a different assessment and felt that the woman did not have special grounds for receiving help with this type of contract,” explains Sara Skoog Waller, who led the work on the report.

For women who want to leave a violent relationship, a new, safe home is crucial. They often bring with them years of physical, psychological and financial abuse. There is also a risk that the violence has escalated in connection with the separation. It is not uncommon for women who are subjected to violence to return to the dangerous homes they have fled from because they do not receive sufficient help to find a new, safe, permanent home.

In the report A place of their own? The rights and opportunities of victims of violence to safe housing after a separation, researchers examined the help that women victims of violence receive from their municipality in terms of finding a new, permanent home. The study is based partly on interviews with some fifty case officers and decision-makers in seven different municipalities, and partly on public documents in the form of investigations and decisions concerning sheltered, temporary and permanent accommodation over a period of two years.

The will is there

The research shows that there is often a willingness to cooperate locally and that many municipalities do very good work, including working with other municipalities. However, in the absence of national governance, support often becomes person-dependent, short-term and vulnerable to reorganisations or changes in working practices. A number of municipalities lack action plans, and interventions are more incident-driven than based on written procedures. This pattern is similar across municipalities, regardless of their size, demographics and degree of housing shortage.

“The further down in the organisation the issue goes, the more unpredictable the support becomes. In one of the municipalities in the study, women were referred to a regular emergency homeless shelter. This is neither a safe nor positive solution for this group, and especially not for their children. It shows that the municipality has overlooked the importance of housing in its efforts to combat domestic violence.”

“You have to take what you get”

Sara Skoog Waller can give many examples of poor outcomes. One such example is when officials signal to women seeking help that “you have to take what you get, be glad you’re alive.” In such cases, the woman is not seen as an individual but only as a survival case. Women in the study describe having to leave their workplace, their networks and the safe places in which they grew up after moving. They may also have had to change their identity. To then end up in sub-standard housing far away and isolated makes everything worse.

“They need to live in a place where they can have a home and create a life that works, where other people are close by and where it’s easy to get to and from school and work. Often, the best thing for children is to be able to stay in their school and maintain their social context.”

Small municipalities sometimes better

The study looked at both large and small municipalities in both urban and rural settings. Support for women often worked better in smaller municipalities, thanks to a smaller organisation and closer cooperation between different working groups. These municipalities also depend more on strong cooperation with other municipalities. In larger municipalities, it was more common for women to be passed around from one office to another, each of which looked at the issue differently.

Violence a special factor

The project is also investigating how financial violence, custody disputes and legal proceedings reinforce and prolong women’s vulnerability even after the relationship has ended. Many victims of violence are currently unable to be named on a contract, for example because of debts, division of joint property matters, or due to not having been gainfully employed during the relationship.

“The municipalities must recognise violence as a special factor. The support must focus on providing a sense of security and an opportunity to recover, and not on requiring the women to achieve certain goals and their own drive. There’s talk about women needing to be independent and take responsibility for their own lives, while being blind to the fact that they’ve just lost their entire lives. In order to help them, case officers need to ask what situation the women are in when they leave.”

A special prioritised group

The report shows that national governance, clear guidelines and a recognised right to permanent housing for victims of violence are all needed. This would reduce disparities between municipalities and create better conditions for recovery and gaining a sense of security, and for the long-term well-being of the children involved.

“This would require the municipalities to include women and children who are victims of violence as a special, prioritised group in their provision of housing plans. Both central government and the municipalities must take greater responsibility for ensuring that this group of women, who have serious and complex needs and are in a very vulnerable situation, really get the coherent support they need,” says Sara Skoog Waller.

Report: "En egen plats? Våldsutsattas rätt och möjligheter till trygga bostadsförhållanden efter separationen"

For more information, contact:

Sara Skoog Waller, researcher at the National Centre for Knowledge on Men’s Violence Against Women (NCK), Uppsala University, e-mail: sara.skoog.waller@nck.uu.se, Phone: +46 76 867 34 39

About the study:

The study is based on interviews, questionnaire-based surveys and a jurisprudential review. The researchers were in contact with all ten municipalities in Gävleborg County. Seven of them were active in the study, and some fifty employees in several different specialties participated. The researchers also requested all applications, investigations and decisions on housing for women victims of violence over a two-year period. They did not get access to any personal data, but did examine case management, documentation and policy documents. In many cases, the researchers were unable to obtain relevant municipal documents, which according to the researchers is indicative of a lack of systematic quality management in some municipalities.