Birmingham’s

Support for homelessness people
Supporting
Birmingham’s
most vulnerable
SIFA Fireside is probably best known
to people in the city through its
drop-in centre and services based
at Allcock Street, Digbeth, where we
work with some of Birmingham’s
most vulnerable adults – people who
are homeless or vulnerably housed.
Many of our clients have multiple and complex needs
and may be affected by alcohol, face mental and physical
health problems, or be otherwise socially excluded.
SIFA Fireside was formed in 2007 through the merger of
two well established Birmingham charities: SIFA (Supporting
Independence from Alcohol) set up in 1982, and the Fireside
Charity (1983). We moved to our current flagship building
in Digbeth in 2011. This gave us space to develop a wider
range of services and work with partners such as the NHS.
2015 saw a change of focus following the recommissioning
of Birmingham’s drug and alcohol services and we’re pleased
to be working closely with CRI, the new service providers.
We took this opportunity to speak with our clients,
look again at their wants and needs and, as a result,
refocus our activities. We found our core mission,
‘meeting immediate needs and creating lasting change’
remained the same and so we continue to support people
who are homeless or vulnerably housed through:
• Immediate and essential support to those in crisis
• Advice, guidance and support to access
emergency, short-term and long-term
accommodation and other housing support
• Debt and benefits advice and support to access financial aid
• Training and employability services
• Interventions to reduce reoffending
• Access to healthcare, including counselling and
mental health and wellbeing services.
Drop-in service
We run a daily drop-in service where we provide over 1,000
breakfasts, 2,000 lunches and 400 showers each month. Our
drop-in sessions are the frontline of SIFA Fireside’s operations,
acting as a gateway for our clients to access longer-term support
services. As well as making sure people don’t go without the
basic necessities, such as food and showers, we provide access to
We run a daily drop-in service
where we provide over 1,000
breakfasts, 2,000 lunches and 400
showers each month.”
a nurse, opticians, and dentistry clinics, drug and alcohol support
services, and tenancy support. We act as advocates for our
clients, for example campaigning for improved access to statutory
health services. To help us in these tasks we’re very fortunate
to have assistance from over 80 volunteers (aged from 18 to
84!) as well as a range of faith groups and corporate partners.
Training and employment
SIFA Fireside believes that everyone should have access
to opportunities to train and work. We have a number of
employment and training programmes such as Changing
Lives (a Big Lottery funded initiative) where we offer a
practical approach through increasing skills and confidence
along with a range of employability workshops, including
CV writing and interview techniques. The Changing Lives
team also operates an outreach service to local hostels and
organisations, providing support within the community,
and in particular to help prevent re-offending.
Clients on this programme face a complex range
of barriers to work so we address the wider issues by
offering workshops around budgeting and IT skills and
healthy eating and providing counselling and mentoring.
8 Update 250 /// February & March 2016