Friend who went through DV now faced with homelessness and losing her kids

[ConcernedCitizenUK]

Hi everyone, I am supporting a friend who is really struggling and we don't know where to turn to for advice and support. Trying my luck here.

She went through an abusive marriage and has 2 small kids.

She left him and got a non molestation order on him and went to the police.

They had a council house but it was in his name, so she left and went to a council to declare homelessness.

Her previous council home was a nice 2 or 3 bedroom house but the council offered her a small council flat.

Unfortunately she received some really bad advice that she should be firm and refuse the property and the council will get her a bigger house.

She did that and the council banned her from being on the housing list and declared her "intentionally homeless".

She had a social worker to support her and also spoke to her local MP for help. But the MP seemed more interested in trying to take the children off her than help her (a tory MP).

The social worker organised hotels for a few weeks and tried to change the councils minds and then now have said they will no longer fund hotels and if she doesnt find housing by tomorrow they will take her kids and put them in foster care.

I have tried contacting journalists, womens aid charities like Refuge, Womens aid etc. They dont even respond.

Womens refuge charities will not help, since she is not in immediate danger, as she left her ex a while ago now.

I have no idea where left to turn to get her help. I am talking to all these people on her behalf and she is also talking to citizens advice etc and we cant find any help at all.

Any suggestions on what to do or who can help?

Your level of aggression to people who don't go along with the 'oh Tories/sw/shelter/housing are bastards, its obviously ALL THEIR FAULT'. Your huge level of involvement and knowing everything but not actually being able to substantiate actual answers to pertinent things.

I’ve read your posts and honestly I think the issue is the way you’re writing it. An example is can you see the nuanced difference in these two statements ?

The social worker organised hotels for a few weeks and tried to change the councils minds and then now have said they will no longer fund hotels and if she doesnt find housing by tomorrow they will take her kids and put them in foster care

Then yesterday the the social worker said the hotels were ending and she also spoke to the MP and they both effectively said that she either needs to find a sofa to sleep on until she fixes her situation, or the social services can offer a Foster home for the kids until her situation is sorted

the first is a threat, the second is an offer. This is the sort of thing folks are responding to. And why the thread is going as it is.

I also think you habe gotten Really angry, as posters have only went on what you wrote. Back to thr example of where you started by saying if she doesn’t find someplace they will take the kids. Multiple people tried to explain that isn’t how child removal works. Which was the correct response based on how you showed the situation. You also brought politics into it. You had a decent offer from the mp. But you don’t think much of it, what exactly do you think they should do.

if you can try to calm down, explain yourself calmly, be it on line, or to people in authority you will get further.

So shea still married? If she doesn't know where he is living, has she applied for Bailiff's Service?

Sorry forgot the link. She'd need Form D89. She can apply with help with the Court fee here.

I'm surprised though if she's been left over 2 years that she hasn't progressed the Divorce already. Is she still on the Tenancy for her former home?

I know that you feel that you are aware of the full situation but please do think again about being her guarantor, especially if you own your own home.

You definitely wouldn't be the first Guarantor to have a CCJ for thousands followed by a Bankruptcy then sale of your home if you were unable to pay. You don't want to end up being homeless too.

Also, she really does need to broaden her search. I've just had a look and in the City I work in, you can get a 2 bedroomed terraces for £600 pcm. It's not going to be a lovely area but it will certainly be a lot better than the streets.

You will regret being her guarantor.

This.

I love lots of work with people who don't qualify for benefits/housing.And this just doesn't happen.

Why are you also ignoring the posters telling you to contact Shelter for advice. They are the housing advice experts. This would qualify as an emergency so you could use the phone line but they often easier to get through to via webchat.

Apologies I see you intend to contact shelter.

You literally dont even know if the SW concerned, is an adults services SW or the children's SW assigned because the children are open to services... yet you portray you know all the ins and outs of what has been assessed and decided!!!!

*Her ex isn't paying child maintainence, and has refused to respond to any divorce letters. He is subletting the council house they were in and the courier was unable to deliver divorce papers to him. The judge refused to proceed the divorce.

And her ex was violent and abusive. She's not going to try and live in that house given that he's threatened to kill her in the past. She's genuinely scared and doesn't want him knowing where she lives. Getting him kicked out of his house and taking the house from him isn't going to work*

I can understand why she doesn’t want to go back to living there but if she has been living in temporary accommodation for 2 years she can now divorce him via no fault divorce and if he can’t be found then she could get the council property transferred into her name.

She has equal claim over the house regardless of who’s name was originally on the rent book as they were married and her ex is not there and it can reasonably be assumed has found alternative accommodation and she needs to have somewhere to raise the dc.

She would be better off finding an area that is much cheaper and driving there and booking her and her children into one of the cheap travel lodges/premier inns for a few nights and hitting the rental agents and getting a lease on something very very cheap and quite small then getting her divorce sorted and see a solicitor about claiming the house

Then kick out the subletters and swap the property for somewhere else even if it is still not where she wants to end up but it would give her a roof over her head and then at her leisure swap again and again till she get some something she actually wants to live in.

It isn’t going to happen over night so getting a place she can easily afford and privately rent in the meantime is the start

Ultimately she is an adult with 2 children who she (her alone, not friends or family or Shelter or the council or any other charity) needs to put a roof over her’s and her dcs heads.

Not wasting time on what might have been, Not wasting time waiting for other people to come up with solutions and then expecting better
Not wasting time and money lying to landlords who are just going to kick her out and keep her deposit.

You say shelter, women's aid etc are "useless" because you can't get through to them. I think its more likely they are completely overwhelmed by the number of people needing help than them just being useless.

Totally agree. They seem overwhelmed and when you look at the possession statistics it's not surprising. Especially when that's not all that they deal with. They'll be having enquiries link the one from the OP's DF.

It's a little bit funny to me that I would be accused of aggression given that I'm only responding to a lot of people claiming that the story has "holes" and "makes no sense", that its all her fault due to her recklessness etc etc.

I'm not being aggressive, maybe I'm a little frustrated at the tone of some of the responses and I did remain patient for quite a while trying to respond to the things that "don't make sense" and then people were simply ignoring the responses "don't make sense".

Some people accused me bare faced of making the whole situation up when it's a real emergency situation that I needed help on.

These aren't very helpful responses.

But as for people sympathising with the tories and their ideology towards people who "don't help themselves", I'm absolutely fine with people believing that rishi sunak is doing a sterling job running the Country. This is not a political post. I certainly haven't been aggressive to anyone because they're sympathetic to the tories. Right now I care about helping my friend, not debating how great rishi sunaks Britain is. I'm fine with people believing whatever they want to believe on the politics front.

People have reached out to me privately in messages and apologised for the way people have responded and offered advice etc. The fact that they didn't want the baying mobs to see that they sympathised with my friend shows who is aggressive here.

Anyway I don't really mind about that as long as I find a solution.

Progress has been made today and people's feedback has been useful and that's what counts

I've already responded to this point repeatedly

I'm sure they are overwhelmed but their phone lines literally don't work. Try calling them and see if you get through. Its like m
noone is even manning the phones.

But as for people sympathising with the tories and their ideology towards people who "don't help themselves", I'm absolutely fine with people believing that rishi sunak is doing a sterling job running the Country. This is not a political post.
Who has done this?
And yes it is a political post, you've mentioned the Tories umpteen times.

I don't own a home and I earn enough salary that I could pay her rent fees for a few months if she stopped paying her rent. But I do not believe she would do that.

She was never on the council tenancy. It was in her exes name.

She got legal aid for a divorce and forwarded me the correspondence between her and her lawyer. Her ex refused to receive the divorce paper and the judge refused to progress the divorce in his absence and i believe that was the last she heard from the divorce lawyer. I can double check.

As far as I'm aware, to divorce someone in England, you need proof that they have received divorce papers. Difficult when he's difficult to find. If you want more detail I can prob screenshot some of the correspondence and block out the PII.

She tried to divorce him early after the police involvement and non molestation from family courts but it stalled for the reasons I've mentioned.

OP I have RTWT - well done to you for not giving up on here and wading through the piles of repetitive and goady posts to try and get help for your friend. As usual in between the shitty nit picking posts there is some good advice.

So fucking what if she made mistakes - she’s got two kids and she’s a human being who has been subject to DV. She deserves shelter, warmth and a safe place- as does every human.

Tories are scum.

Best of luck OP.

Actually this particular feedback didn't make me angry, it was actually useful.

We weren't aware that kids can't be taken away without a court order.

She went to the school today and they have some sort of welfare officer at the school and she told them about the threat to her kids and they were appalled and have called her social worker.

They said the same thing that as she's a competent mother that there would be no justification for taking the kids away.

The social worker has now back pedalled a little and said there is simply no housing but they're going to have another look at getting the council to reverse their decision.

She also sat in the council office for hours but the council said she needed to go to social services and they've washed their hands of her.

She did also go to citizens advice but it was closed today so that's on the list for tomorrow.

So no, definitely didn't get angry with the information about social workers.

But the MP seemed to be driving this idea. I have the email where the MP suggested this a month ago, and yet the social worker only mentioned it yesterday after talking to the MP.

I might just screenshot the MPs email since apparently some people are trying their best to prove this whole story is an elaborate scam to discredit the tories or something lol

Faith in humanity restored

This thread is so depressing. So basically if you are brave enough to leave a DV situation but make one mistake in turning down a council flat then you are condemned forever from having other accommodation offered even when there are children involved ?? I can't get my head around this nor the fact that lots of people think this is OK. Why are the children being punished because of this bureaucratic nonsense

She was appointed the social worker 2 years ago when she fled domestic violence.

These aren't holes. These are attempts to pick holes.

Could she get a caravan and live on a site for a while? I know someone that did that. Was about £125 a week. Hot showers on site etc. Cooking facilities in the caravan plus toilet. A seating area that was permanently made into a huge bed, and bunk beds for the kids ?

She CANNOT have had a social worker involved for 2 years. She just can't. Unless there is a LOT more to it than you know.

Why not? There is nothing more to it. I have all the correspondence.

I'll double check when the social workers got involved but I'm pretty sure it was straight after she went to the police and family courts etc.

Pretty sure it was the social services that helped her get emergency accommodation but I'll confirm to be sure.

But I'm not sure why a social worker can't have been helping her for a two year period.