Sheffield stages five events in Action Week 2008

Over 200 people, including church leaders, 12 city councillors and David Blunkett MP, attended one or more of these events:

• A homelessness service at the Unitarian Upper Chapel, organised by the Churches Homelessness Forum, at which Judith Maizel-Long of Housing Justice spoke.
  
• A poverty hearing at St Wilfred’s Centre (for the homeless, vulnerable and socially excluded), where some users of the centre and some asylum-seekers gave detailed accounts of the difficulties and discrimination that they had encountered.
  
• A poverty hearing at Shiregreen United Reformed Church, where testimonies were heard, particularly of the bureaucratic hurdles faced by those facing redundancy or wishing to return to work.
  
• A poverty hearing at Broomhall Centre on the theme of "Housing and Homelessness", which drew attention especially to the increasing shortage of affordable housing in the city.
  
• A poverty breakfast at St Mary’s Bramall Lane, on the theme of mental health, and the barriers to employment and a reasonable income felt by those suffering from mental illness.
  

We drew the attention of all the Sheffield MPs and councillors to the main findings from these events, which included:

• the need for more affordable housing;
• debt problems and bureaucracy as a cause of homelessness;
• ill health, including mental ill health, as a cause of homelessness;
• inadequate legal services and a ban on working for asylum-seekers;
• bureaucratic barriers to claiming benefits and to easing the return to work.