14 she was no longer allowed to work

After her leave to remain expired
she was no longer allowed to work.
She claimed asylum,
was relying on food from friends
and charities.
No one had heard from her for four days.
Her one-year-old son
weakened from starvation
was found by police
crying
beside her body.

[Herald Scotland, 25/08/2020, Mum ‘found dead beside starving one-year-old baby’ in Glasgow flat]

25 long hours

She was brought up as a slave
long hours
scraps of leftover food like a dog
fine scars down one side of her face and right leg.
At the age of 15
she was sold to a trafficker
who brought her to the UK.
In London
she was locked in a house
and repeatedly raped.
She escaped.
She later gave birth to a daughter.
She wanted to study English
get a job
walk away from life
on benefits.
She struggled to buy shoes for her children.
Then the Department informed her
it was axing her support
because she had failed to show them a document
she had never been asked
to produce.
She called the Department helpline.
Waited to speak to someone.
A recorded message informed her
there would be
a charge
for the call.

[The Guardian, 06/01/2016, The DWP – a bureaucracy of outstanding brutality]

62 stop worrying

You are a fucking bitch”: a man’s voice.
Then the sound of violent banging,
a woman’s sobs.
Officers were on the way;
sobbing and breathing heavily,
she said the man had retreated.
Police arrived and arrested him.
She had opened her window.
If the man had succeeded in getting through the door
she was prepared to jump two floors to escape.

The woman was calling from her bedroom.
She had been placed in ‘exempt’ supported housing
after leaving prison –
a five-year term for serious fraud and deception.
She had a history of mental illness:
suicide attempts, spells in psychiatric hospitals.
She had been the victim of violent abuse
at the hands of a former partner:
twice he had fractured her skull;
marks on her arms; burn scars
snaking across her chest,
where he had set her on fire
while she slept.
The man hammering on her door that night
was a troubled alcoholic with demons of his own.
He was under
a suspended prison sentence
for making threats with a machete.
Police ultimately did not bring charges against him –
a result of conflicting versions of events that night.
“Officers attended the address just after midnight
and arrested a man.
It was alleged he had
been verbally aggressive to the woman,
made threats, and
damaged the door to her room.
The woman was not injured.
The man was later released without charge;
the property owner said
the damage to the door
was already there.
He would not support
a prosecution.”
A Probation Service spokesperson said
“Prisoners released without somewhere to live
are 50 per cent more likely to reoffend.
Providing basic accommodation on release
helps cut crime and make
our streets safer.”
The man was moved to another property.

Exempt accommodation: supported housing
funded through a higher rate of housing benefit, exempt
from caps applied to normal housing.
Prison leavers, rough sleeper, refugees and migrants,
substance abusers, people with mental health issues,
disabilities, people at risk of homelessness:
strangers
housed together, mostly left
to their own devices, with arms-length help
amounting to an hour or so of dedicated support a week;
a support worker
at the end of a mobile phone.

She has lost weight and become more ill;
thefts were so common
she now stored her kitchen pans and cutlery in her bedroom.
She described a fellow resident:
he had not been out of his pyjamas or had a wash
for five weeks; he kept her awake all night.

Access is via a steel staircase.
Inside, the corridors and shared kitchen and common room
are monitored by CCTV with audio mics;
private conversations may be listened to.
Bedrooms are small.
A hole burnt in the kitchen top,
rusted hobs. The common area and kitchen
are full of the belongings of one of the tenants;
crudely written notices in felt tip
on stereo, tv, kitchen gear:
‘hands off’.
Heating comes from plugged in storage heaters.
In the night it’s freezing.

“I eat two sausages and vegetables every night,
cereal in the morning.
I don’t drink, don’t take drugs, yet
it’s all around.
Nobody seems to do anything much about it.”
At her lowest point she tried to jump in front of a train.
She was pulled back at the last minute;
another spell in psychiatic hospital.
“While living here
suicide is the only thing
that goes through my head,
day in,
day out.
The owners say I am too much hard work for them,
they said
they didn’t have problems
before I moved in.
It’s not a great place to be.
The landlord told me
‘just ignore it’, stop worrying
about other people.”

[Birmingham Live, 25/09/2021, Chaos, fear and suicide attempts – life inside ‘exempt’ housing in Birmingham]