Safe and secure housing is fundamental to living with dignity.

Each year, we mark Homelessness Week by standing alongside people experiencing homelessness and advocating for the changes needed to ensure everyone has access to a safe place to call home. 

People seeking asylum, and other vulnerable migrants on temporary visas, are excluded from housing and homelessness services because of their visa status, lack of work rights, and other structural barriers. 

Through our Finding Safety Project at the Women’s Space, we regularly support women who have fled family and domestic violence only to face another impossible decision: remain with the perpetrator or face homelessness. 

No woman should ever have to make that choice. 

What we are seeing 

Our frontline experience shows that homelessness among people on temporary visas is driven by a combination of intersecting factors rather than a single cause. 

Women escaping violence often face immigration-facilitated abuse, where perpetrators use visa insecurity, financial dependence or misinformation about migration processes as forms of coercive control. 

Many women are unable to access mainstream supports because they do not have permanent residency, work rights or eligibility for income support. Others experience significant trauma that affects their ability to rebuild their lives after leaving violence. 

Housing itself is also increasingly difficult to access. 

Emergency accommodation is limited, refuges are under significant pressure, and there are too few safe, long-term housing options available. Women who do secure crisis accommodation often have nowhere to move afterwards, creating bottlenecks that leave other women unable to access shelter when they need it most. 

These are not isolated stories. They reflect systemic barriers that continue to place women and families at risk of homelessness. 

Our response 

JRS Australia provides practical support to people experiencing or at risk of homelessness through emergency relief, casework, legal assistance, community programs and specialist support for women experiencing family and domestic violence. 

Alongside this work, we advocate for policies that address the structural causes of homelessness. 

We know that when people have access to safe housing, trauma-informed support and opportunities to rebuild their lives, they can recover, reconnect with their communities and participate fully in Australian society. 

Our advocacy priorities 

Drawing on our frontline experience, we are calling for: 

• Safe, stable and long-term housing options for everyone experiencing or at risk of homelessness, regardless of visa status. 

• Greater investment in specialist, trauma-informed services supporting refugee and migrant women experiencing family and domestic violence. 

• Reform of housing assistance programs to remove barriers faced by people on temporary visas, including access to the NSW Rent Choice Start Safely program. 

• Better pathways to employment and financial independence, including access to work rights. 

• Trauma-informed responses across police, Victims Services and other frontline systems, including improved access to qualified interpreters. 

• Full implementation of the National Plan to End Violence against Women and Children 2022–2032 in ways that include women on temporary visas. 

• Recognition of adequate housing as a fundamental human right, including through a Human Rights Act for New South Wales, and for Australia. 

Stories from our community 

Policy change begins with a community that listened then took action. 

Throughout Homelessness Week, we share stories from the people we accompany and the staff who walk alongside them every day. These stories reveal both the human impact of homelessness and the hope that is created when people are given the support they need to rebuild their lives. 

We invite you to explore some of these stories: 

• Where Their Struggle Is, So Is Their Strength – Chloe Watts reflects on how homelessness, gender-based violence and visa insecurity intersect for women on temporary visas. Drawing on her experience in the Finding Safety Project, Chloe challenges deficit-based narratives and reminds us that women should be recognised not for the barriers they face, but for the extraordinary resilience and leadership they show every day. Read the reflection.
   

• Beyond the Final Whistle – Magdalene Konneh reflects on the contrast between the way Australia celebrates migrants’ achievements on the world stage, and the realities faced by the women she supports through the Finding Safety Project. Her reflection challenges harmful rhetoric and calls for an Australia where every woman has the opportunity not just to survive, but to belong and thrive. Read the story
   

• A Safe Place to Sleep: Anita’s Story – Anita’s journey reminds us that escaping violence should never mean facing homelessness. After leaving an abusive relationship while pregnant, she found herself with nowhere safe to go. Her story highlights both the extraordinary resilience of women seeking safety and the urgent need for more accessible housing pathways. Read Anita’s story
   

• A Day in the Life of our Finding Safety Project Manager – Sara Muzamil shares what it is like to respond to women and children experiencing crisis every day through our Women’s Space. Her reflection offers a powerful insight into the difficult decisions, systemic barriers and moments of hope that shape the Finding Safety Project. Read Sara’s reflection
   

• Finding Safety Project: When the System Fails, We Step In — But We Can’t Do It Alone – Through Reva’s story, we explore how specialist services are often forced to fill gaps left by existing systems, and why sustainable investment is needed to ensure women on temporary visas are not forced to choose between violence and homelessness. Read Reva’s story
   

• Julia’s Story: Hope. Safety. Permanency. – Julia’s story demonstrates what is possible when women have access to long-term, holistic support. From crisis to permanency, her journey reminds us why investing in specialist services changes lives. Read Julia’s story 

Join us 

Each Homelessness Week, we will continue adding new reflections and lived experience stories – until we can tell a different one, together. We invite you to learn more, share our stories, support our advocacy and stand with refugees, people seeking asylum and other people on temporary visas as we work towards an Australia where everyone has a safe place to call home.