The Housing Employment Link Project (HELP) was funded by Communities and Local Government and works across seven West London boroughs: Brent, Ealing, Hammersmith and Fulham, Harrow, Hillingdon, Hounslow and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea.
It was initially a 2 year pilot project that sought to create a model for referring workless West London residents living in Temporary Accommodation, facing homelessness or with a housing need into local employment and training agencies. From April 2009 the project was awarded Enhanced Housing Options 'Trailblazer' status by CLG and was funded until March 2011.
Work continued across the seven boroughs to embed the culture change that the project has brought about and work is continuing to keep employment at the heart of Housing Options.
HELP has trained over 350 West London Housing Options Advisers to equip them with the skills to refer customers in housing need and those living in temporary accommodation into training and employment opportunities. Utilising their contact time with a traditionally hard-to-help client group, Housing Options Advisers are routinely discussing employment and training aspirations with their customers, linking them to local training and Information, Advice and Guidance (IAG) providers.
The project has also worked with staff from Housing Associations and private sector managing agents that manage temporary accommodation to refer their tenants to employment and training provision.
In addition, HELP has worked alongside staff from identified training providers to raise awareness of the barriers faced by those living in temporary accommodation in accessing employment and training. By adopting this innovative approach, 86 workless residents living in either temporary accommodation or social housing have found employment with over 130 more people entering some form of training.
