Without Branches I would be dead, 100%. They have helped me to have a life.
By Victoria Munro
To celebrate 25 years helping the homeless, charity Branches invited the Echo to speak to current and former residents of its Walthamstow hostel.
The project began when seven local churches joined together to create a winter night shelter, offering a place to sleep and a hot meal to 10 homeless people.
The charity quickly grew and, in the early 2000s, bought a former factory building in Forest Road to use as a day centre, supporting up to 300 people a year.
In partnership with Waltham Forest Council and the Christian Action Housing Association, Branches then won government funding to redevelop the site, opening its current 27-bed hostel in 2011.
Trustee Winston Reid explained Branches is now a referal-only service, housing homeless people for “about 12-18 months… to help stabilise them” until they are ready to move on elsewhere and offering continued support for at least six months after they leave.
Current resident Martin*, 44, is one of those ready to move on and waiting to be rehoused by the council after getting his alcoholism under control.
He told the Echo: “I lost everything because of alcohol, including my house and my job of six years as a chef. I was on the streets for a couple of weeks before I ended up in a mental health hospital and they brought me here.
“Life on the streets is cold, people are fighting all the time for food or alcohol and they will even steal your jacket while you’re sleeping. Because my eye is damaged, some people look at me like I’ve done something wrong but I was just born with it.”
Martin hopes to return to his old career and has enjoyed cooking for the other residents, adding: “Before I was so down and now I’m finally taking some steps up. Without Branches I would be dead, 100%. They have helped me to have a life.”
Also helping in the kitchen during the Echo’s visit was Hikmet Pala, a 66-year-old “Marxist revolutionary” from Turkey, who notes he has “lived in the borough longer than the council leader”.
Hikmet moved to the UK after the 1980 Turkish coup because he was unwilling to live under a military government and had “always wondered about the British way of life”. After separating from his wife Sarah, who he met through left-wing activism, he ended up on the streets after his Universal Credit was cut off when he reached pension age.
He told the Echo: “During winter, I would move from one church to another and in the summer I was just hanging around, either on friends’ sofas or by the side of the railway.
“The staff looking after us here are absolutely extraordinary, they’re so caring, very careful and attentive to details.
“I have a feeling pretty soon I’ll be able to move on but I’m not looking forward to it because I’m pretty content here.”
Unlike Martin and Hikmet, ex-resident Satvinder Singh Riyat, 60, has always lived in the borough and is now safely settled in sheltered accommodation in Leyton.
Despite leaving Branches five years ago, he says the charity still supports him and thanks them, outreach service StreetLink and the council’s Rough Sleeping team for where he is today.
After a “family situation” forced him to leave home, Satvinder slept on the streets from January to November one year, on two wooden pallets covered with carpet and cardboard.
He told the Echo: “I never thought I would be homeless and didn’t realise how it would affect me, mentally and physically. I still have flashbacks about once a month where I wake up thinking I’m on the streets.
“You always have to have one eye open: I was robbed 13 times and got beaten up three times. Alcohol became a problem because it was the only way I could sleep.
“For the first eight months, I didn’t ask for any help but, when it started getting cold, someone from StreetLink left a card with a number. I phoned them up and they got on the case straight away.
“When I came to Branches, it was a shock: the bed was made, I could shower properly, it was like moving into a Premier Lodge. They got me mental health support and helped me with my application for benefits.”
Fellow ex-resident Soleman Chummun, 34, also grew up in the borough and spent a total of three years sleeping rough after being kicked out by his father.
He told the Echo: “I was not daddy’s good boy, I was a little rebel, and he didn’t like it so I couldn’t stay home.
“[Sleeping rough] was the worst, really bad. By the time my housing officer got me into Branches, I was at my wit’s end, I was thinking of stepping in front of traffic just to get help.”
However, even Soleman’s time at Branches became difficult when he got into a relationship with a woman struggling with a crack cocaine addiction, who introduced him to the drug.
Soleman said: “I didn’t ask for help because my pride got the better of me and, when Branches found out, I was facing eviction. Literally a week after that, I ended up getting into trouble with the police.
“My flat got raided when my friend was here and he had a BB gun stuffed down his jacket. I had no idea he had it on him but I got a conspiracy charge and a five-year suspended sentence.
“I thought it was game over and I would get my marching orders but Branches didn’t give up on me. I spent the next year in the kitchen cooking food as a thank you for not kicking me out. That point was where my life started coming back together.
“Now I work in the security industry at stadiums and stations across the country. I love my job, it’s the reason I have everything I have on me, because I bought it with my hard wages. I’m trying to get back into cycling and get some normality back in my life.
“If it wasn’t for the opportunities I had here, I’d probably be on the streets involved in drugs and gangs. I’m thankful I got out of that life when I did because I have too much to live for, getting off crack and away from that girl is one of the best things I have done for myself.”
Despite how far Branches has come from its humble beginnings, the charity already has plans to expand again.
Winston explained they have raised £1million to buy a five or six-bed property in the borough, which they hope to use as a “move-on accommodation” for residents not quite ready to live independently.
Find out more about Branches and donate here.
*not his real name
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