When does alcohol consumption verge into the danger zone of dependency – Article published in the Gazette & Herald newspaper – April 2013

 You can tell from the surprised look on her face that the conversation really isn’t going the way that she had expected when she had first initiated it. Although it had started as a chat with friends about general stuff, it had somehow naturally progressed onto the subject of alcohol consumption.

 It quickly becomes very apparent that the admission of a bottle of wine being consumed on most weekend nights had not received a positive response from her friends.

And so, overhearing this exchange of views led me to start questioning at what point is your alcohol intake deemed to be socially unacceptable? Is it if you drink before 6pm? Or if you drink at lunchtime? Or if you drink by yourself? Or if you drink more than a glass of wine with dinner every night? Or if you binge drink at the weekends?

People are generally very quick to point the finger and call some one else an alcoholic without necessarily first looking at their own drinking habits. I’ve known responsible mothers drink a glass of wine after they’ve come home from the school run and I’ve known professional adults drink a bottle of wine each with their evening meal. But how often does anyone question whether that crosses the line of acceptable behaviour or not?

As a society we generally forget that alcohol is a drug and can cause serious dependencies in a number of people. We see marketing campaigns all around us on a daily basis and we associate alcohol with holidays, unwinding after a stressful day, socialising with friends, and celebrations.

However, alcohol is addictive, both physically and psychologically. There are varying degrees of alcohol dependence and they don’t always involve excessive levels of drinking.

Drinkaware state that “The NHS estimates that around 9% of men in the UK and 4% of UK women show signs of alcohol dependence. This means that drinking alcohol becomes an important, or sometimes the most important, factor in their life and they feel they’re unable to function without it.”

Yet it’s still considered socially acceptable to disapprove of, and make judgements, about whether or not the rough sleeper is begging for money to pay for his alcohol dependency. Without actually considering why they might have the dependency in the first place. And, it is also worth remembering that not every rough sleeper actually has a drug or alcohol dependency.

I recently read on twitter the following comment “dear loud drunks, don’t laugh at homeless drug addict, the only thing that separates you both is you still have money for your addiction”. Which neatly sums up the fact that it is also considered to be socially acceptable to go out drinking excessively with your friends and shout abuse at, or physically attack, the guy sleeping rough in the doorway. The only difference is that you can afford to go out and buy / drink your alcohol in a public building and the guy in the doorway is reduced to drinking cheap alcohol out of plastic bottles from the local convenience store.

One of our Doorway ‘guests’ recently spoke publicly about why he became dependent on alcohol whilst he was sleeping rough on the streets of Chippenham and explained that he would drink alcohol because he hadn’t slept, because he was cold, because he had hours and hours of time to kill, and because he wanted to numb the pain or the emotions. Not because it complimented his choice of food for his evening meal.

Now I was brought up with the bizarre ruling that you shouldn’t really drink alcohol before 6pm. Although, rather confusingly, the guidelines for weekend drinking were always somewhat rather more hazy… and 6pm was, and still is, always known gin and tonic time.

And rather embarrassingly, I will also admit that if I’m out with a group of people then I always feel that I am more self confident, more social and talkative, and more ‘entertaining’ if I’ve had a drink.

And I really enjoy a glass of wine with my evening meal as a way to wind down and relax after a stressful day at work. So the question that I should be asking myself is “Do I have an alcohol dependency?”

Iain Duncan Smith – Friend or Foe of the Poor? Article published in the Gazette & Herald newspaper – March 2013

 He rises from his chair to address the assembled delegation and a wave of expectancy charges through the conference room.

 A moment of hush, before he starts his carefully worded speech. The cleverly timed opening sentence, deliberately humorous, causes a ripple of laughter throughout the audience. I am embarrassed to find myself, unconsciously, smiling along with everyone else.

The charisma that he exudes is almost palpable. The self confident manner, the way he projects his voice, and the way he has of drawing you in and making you think that he is talking directly to you, alone, like you’re the only person in the room.

And even I, with my extreme levels of cynicism, find myself caught up in Iain Duncan Smith’s speech at the Social Justice conference last October. I find myself believing that he really does understand how to transform the lives of the most disadvantaged families and individuals.

But, on the train journey back from London that evening, there is a niggling concern in the back of my mind that there is one fundamental problem with the entire Social Justice framework – The Chair of the Social Justice Cabinet Committee, The Rt Hon Iain Duncan Smith (IDS) just happens (rather ironically) to also be the Secretary of State for the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP).

In 2004, as a backbencher, IDS founded the Centre for Social Justice, a centre-right think tank (independent of the Conservative Party) working with small charities with the aim of finding innovative policies for tackling poverty. In 2005, he was appointed Chairman of the Social Justice Policy Group, which was facilitated by the Centre for Social Justice, and the group’s aim was to “study the causes and consequences of poverty in Britain and seek practical ideas to empower the least well-off”.

The Group then went on to oversee the publication of several major reports on a wide range of subjects including family breakdown, welfare reform, criminal justice, educational reform, gang culture and children’s welfare. In March 2012 HM Government published the cross government strategy “Social Justice: transforming lives” which set out its aspiration for Social Justice. The strategy sets out a vision of society in which families and individuals, facing multiple disadvantages, get the support they need to turn their lives around.

At Doorway, because of the issues that we see affecting the most disadvantaged and marginalised individuals, we are firm believers in the concept of Social Justice. For us, the definition of the term is about equality and fairness between human beings. All human beings. Across all classes, races, genders, and cultures. Which is actually impossible to establish in a society that has such a rapidly increasing divide between the rich and the poor.

Social inequality, although very different, is directly linked to economic inequality. Whilst economic inequality is caused by the unequal accumulation of wealth, social inequality exists because the lack of wealth prevents people from obtaining the same housing, health care, etc. as the wealthy.

And therefore, I would publicly applaud anyone who showed the initiative to come up with the idea for such a potentially controversial group. But, the niggling concern that needs to be voiced is that the man who set up the Centre for Social Justice is the very same man who is now setting up the perfect conditions for the devastating impact of the DWP’s Welfare Reform Act on the most disadvantaged

In other words, as I understand it, he will actually be creating the exact conditions that he seeks to prevent. And I find that really rather puzzling.

And surely, therefore, the utopian ideals of Iain Duncan Smith’s Social Justice Group are sounding increasingly far fetched with every devastating welfare reform announced by him at the DWP.

But listening to IDS on that conference day, last year, before I was fully aware of the potential consequences of the Welfare Reform Act, I almost believed that he had the interests of the most vulnerable and disadvantaged at heart.

And I am now rather ashamed to admit just how naive I was.

The Reality of the Welfare Reform – article published in the Gazette & Herald newspaper – Feb 2013

 I watch him as he shuffles up the steps. Slowly placing one foot in front of the other whilst trying to hold on to the rail, and his bag, at the same time as balancing his walking stick without tripping. It takes all his mental effort to prevent a fall.

 My heart sinks as I open the door for him and a rush of cold air hits my face. I see the shadow of the man he once was, not so very long ago.

A rush of mixed emotions courses through me. Both a sense of sheer relief that he is still alive and a feeling of dread in anticipation of the reply to our standard greeting “how are you?”

His immediate response surprises me. He drops to his knees in order to be able to see the signing in sheet on the front desk. He looks up at me and the tears appear in his eyes, then slowly begin to trickle, in lines, down his weathered looking face.

And my heart breaks once again that week…

I look back at him, through the tears that are already starting to well up in my own eyes, and I wonder just what has happened to our society that leads to my witnessing grown men crying out of sheer desperation.

This isn’t a one off situation. It’s been occurring, here at Doorway, more and more frequently over the last few months. I’ve become somewhat hardened, over the years, to the complex issues that I face every week, but even I wasn’t prepared for the constant emotional battering that I am currently experiencing.

The experts tell you not to take your work home with you. Not to let it affect your home life. To switch off and forget. But you can’t just forget the sadness, the anger, the frustration and the despair that resonates around you. You automatically absorb it and then it just sits there, silently festering, whilst you become more and more cynical about the society you live in.

He’s been coming to our drop-in sessions for years. He is one of those guys who can entertain with his stories, the kind that you could listen to for hours. He’s had a really rather eventful life. But now he is paying for it. Now I’m not a medical person, I don’t fully comprehend the condition. He’s tried to explain to me how he has a degenerative sight condition but all I can see is the shame behind his eyes. He doesn’t want to be a burden, he doesn’t want us to feel sorry for him, he doesn’t want to have to rely on benefits.

He’s still on his knees. Words pour out from his mouth like “benefits stopped”, “fit to work”, “tribunal”, and “court”.

I reel backwards in shock. They are claiming that he is fit to work although he is nearly blind. They have stopped his benefits. He has to go to court, for a tribunal, after his appeal failed.

And suddenly I understand. The humiliation of having to go to court. The mental health issues from the worry of the way the system has been slowly grinding away in the background for months. He hadn’t told us what was happening. He was ashamed to ask for help.

They say that ‘a perfect storm’ is coming.  A combination of factors including falling incomes, rising costs of living, increasing unemployment, a lack of decent jobs and the proposed benefit cuts will affect those who are already the most vulnerable in our society. It will be devastating and catastrophic and it will affect more people than can be imagined.

The Welfare Reform Act 2012 received Royal Assent to become law in March last year and legislates for the biggest change to the entire welfare system for over 60 years. The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) claims that it will “make the benefits and tax credits systems fairer and simpler by: creating the right incentives to get more people into work; protecting the most vulnerable in our society; delivering fairness to those claiming benefit and to the taxpayer.”

Whilst many agree that the welfare system simply hasn’t worked, there is currently a public outrage amidst a common belief that the DWP claims are untrue and that the result of the welfare reform, this year, will drive many more people into poverty without delivering the projected economic recovery.

More and more people have already being driven into debt, hunger and homelessness and from April millions more will be hit by the bedroom tax, cuts in council tax benefits, the ending of disability living allowance, the benefit cap, to name just a few of the reforms.

And so I look down at him, still on his knees in front of me, and I wonder just how those who make the decisions can sleep at night. I see the real life people. The human beings, not the statistics. And I watch grown men cry.

Note: Doorway is a drop-in centre (and so much more) for homeless and vulnerably housed people based in Chippenham but serving the entire north of Wiltshire.

“Loss”

Loss is an empire

built of poor stone

Loss is a kingdom

without any throne

Loss is my love

who never came home

a dog bound and bleeding

dreaming of bones.

Loss is a train

that jumped off the track

Loss is a moment

you can not get back

Lost are the sorry excuses I lack

more pain to impale me

as I drown in the sack

Loss is a forest

without any trees

Loss is an angel

struck down with disease

Loss is a proud man

brought down to his knees

Loss is my lot

so get lost if you please.

poem written by SD, Doorway Guest 13th February 2013

Chief Executive Lisa Lewis’s Report to the Doorway AGM

(This report, written by Lisa, was read at the AGM by Doorway Administrator Sian, in the  absence of Lisa, who was unfortunately unavailable through sickness).

Lisa being interviewed by Mark Horvath July 2012

Chief Executive Report to the Doorway Wiltshire Ltd AGM
21st November 2012

As you are all aware, we regularly invite our guests to provide feedback to us so that we can both monitor the effectiveness of our service and also look at ways in which we can further develop the work that we do. The following was written by a guest a couple of months ago and this really sums up why we, at Doorway, do what we do…:

“I have recently started using Doorway after being made homeless, after feeling suicidal and depressed I felt alone and lost. After 5 weeks of visiting Doorway Lisa, Mike and all the team at Doorway I have been given a huge amount of support including legal advice, food, emotional support, clothing. I have come to realise that I am not useless, I know for a fact that without this service and support I would surely not be alive today. My deepest respect to staff and volunteers for a life saving service.”

Now life at Doorway is never dull, and I have mentioned before that working at Doorway is very much like riding a very fast emotional rollercoaster. I will happily admit that there are times, when I question why we put ourselves through the stresses and frustrations of the day to day running of our organisation.

Why? Because of the results that we regularly achieve. Because we make life just a little bit better for our guests. Because we do actually save lives. And because when we speak out on behalf of those who are most excluded in our local community, we are now starting to be heard both locally and nationally.

Over the last 18 months we have written and published three significant, and very topical, reports that have received very good feedback from organisations throughout the country.

- “The Devil in Cider” report was written by Martin, one of our volunteers after we conducted a survey on white cider, superstrength lagers and minimum alcohol pricing

- “The Face of Homelessness” report was based on the conclusions of the in depth guest survey that was carried out in 2010, and suggests that the state and society are failing to deal with the interconnected issues faced by the homeless.

- “The Welfare Reforms & Agency” report was based on data taken from the 2012 guest survey, and assumes that in an ideal society there should be the concept of effective agency; ie that people should be autonomous and in control of their lives. The report concludes that our guests’ lives are being greatly affected by the current welfare reforms and that their experiences of this should be recorded, and therefore their voices heard.

Doorway has also been regularly featured in both local and national publications including:
• The Gazette and Herald newspaper, whose support for us has been phenomenal over the last few years.
• Inside Housing magazine which is known to be the leading national publication for the housing sector.
• Homeless Link’s Connect Magazine which published our article on rural homelessness, small charities, and engaging with the local community.
• Channel Four News producers and presenters also met with me with the intention of featuring ex service homeless personnel on an extended news programme. Unfortunately, after the meeting I decided that it wasn’t in the best interests of our guests to be portrayed on national television on this occasion.
• Doorway has also been mentioned, very recently, in “Talk of the Town” and the “Chippenham Advertiser” and we have just had an article (written by a volunteer) published in Wiltshire Life
• BBC Radio Wiltshire has contacted me on numerous occasions (often with very little notice) for my opinion on breaking news items if they are relevant to the work that we do.

The fact that we are regularly being approached in order to provide quotes or articles confirms that even though we are a small rural organisation, we are gaining credibility throughout the sector on a national level.

This was further reinforced in June this year when Mark Horvath visited a drop-in session. I have built up a good Twitter relationship with Mark over the last couple of years and it was his work with invisiblepeople.tv that inspired me to both set up our community blog and utilise the power of social media in order to relay the stories of our guests to a wide audience. Mark undertook a 10-day UK road trip (sponsored by British Airways) in order to learn more about homelessness over this side of the pond. Due to the rather vocal nature of my arguments around the issue of rural homelessness being very different to that which occurs in the bigger cities, Mark decided to visit Doorway as his only excursion to an organisation outside of London.

To put his visit into some sort of perspective, the US Huffington Post named Mark one of 11 Twitter activists everyone should follow. YouTube gave InvisiblePeople.TV unprecedented exposure allowing Horvath to curate YouTube’s homepage for a day.

The media coverage that we subsequently got from this visit was phenomenal. Not only did the article that Mark wrote on his visit to Doorway get published on Huffington Post US and UK but also was featured on the Guardian website. There was a very strange moment in the world of Twitter when one of his tweets about Doorway was retweeted (in the US) over 250 times in the space of just a couple of minutes. The fall out from this was that my phone nearly died from the overload of beeping.

Fundraising is one of those aspects of our organisation that has developed, over the course of the last year, in ways that I never imagined was possible.Not only have we proved that a higher percentage of donations have come from the local community than ever before but the range of activities, events and organisations that are supporting us has become more diverse and more ‘outside the box’ for example members of the public have:
• Walked the 184 mile Thames Path
• Run marathons, half marathons and 10k races
• Cycled from John O’ Groats to Lands End
• One of our volunteers got married and asked for donations instead of wedding presents
• Local businesses such as Barclays, John Lewis and Wadworth have organised gig nights, coffee mornings, balls and dinner dances,
• Community fundraising schemes have taken place through stores such as Costcutter, Waitrose and Esso
• The MOD Corsham, the Churches, local Rotary Clubs, Schools and other local organisations such as Hermann Miller and C&P Medical Training have all donated generously to support Doorway over the last financial year.
• The newly rejuvenated Friends of Doorway have been extremely successful in their active fundraising over the last year including the now legendary January SleepOut, the Spring Fair, Flash Mob, street collections in all the local major towns, and various other appearances around the area including the local Art in The Park event.

Raising our profile in the local community and highlighting the issues surrounding homelessness has also been made possible over the last year with appearances at award ceremonies.
• Doorway was nominated for two awards at the 2011 Wiltshire Health & Wellbeing Awards ceremony in Salisbury. We were shortlisted for the ‘Reducing smoking prevalence and/or preventing alcohol & drug abuse in children, young people and adults’, which we won last year; and we won a Highly Commended award for our contribution to ‘Improving mental health and wellbeing’. This means that we have now won awards for both of the categories in which we work and
• Last month we were shortlisted for an award at the Wiltshire Council & NHS Wiltshire Voluntary and Community Awards ceremony. I am incredibly proud that, although we didn’t win our category for “Improving Quality of Life”, we were up against two incredibly large and influential organisations – 1. The Wiltshire Links Scheme which has 1600 volunteers and 2. Age UK Wiltshire & Age UK Salisbury.
However, we cannot be complacent. I predict that 2013 will be an incredibly challenging year for both our organisation and our guests. The DWP’s Welfare Reform Bill will be introduced from April and this will have devastating consequences on the lives of our guests. Reducing housing benefit for under 25’s; introduction of the bedroom tax; changes to the DLA system; cap on benefits; non dependant deductions and the new universal credit system will have a serious impact on the lives of both our current and our future guests. Doorway needs to be ready for the increased demand on our services.

So, to sum up, it has been a rather extraordinary year in the life of Doorway. However, none of this has been achieved without the strong, cohesive and highly committed team of staff, volunteers and trustees. I would like to thank you all for the time, effort and commitment that you have given to Doorway over the last year. I am incredibly grateful to every one of you, for enabling us to continue to provide an exemplary service to our local community.

And so to finish on another quote, this time by Al Summers who facilitates our monthly music sessions:
“It is impossible to measure the knock-on effect of what Doorway does is. I know of several people for whom it has dramatically transformed their lives, sometimes practically, often in important but less obvious ways – such as self-esteem and hope for the future. I particularly notice the social effect: marginalised people with little or no sense of self-worth mutually supporting each other, caring for and about other people.
Doorway’s value to society is impossible to estimate [but very easy to underestimate]. I also work with police personnel and nurses: those who know about Doorway tell me they recognise that its work saves the NHS and Police services vast amounts of money and resources.”

Doorway and Me, by volunteer Derek

A piece written by Derek, a Doorway volunteer, for reading out at the Doorway AGM on Wednesday November 21st 2012, in St Andrew’s Church in Chippenham. Derek could not be at the meeting, so this was read out verbatim by Doorway Support Worker Mike. They are Derek’s thoughts rather than being a statement by Doorway.

My name is Derek. I have been a volunteer at Doorway for about 3 years. I am a retired person with a background that I thought would be useful at Doorway. Fortunately Doorway thought the same and I spent time at training days to prepare me. I would just stress here that if any of you were to volunteer, you do not get dropped in at the deep end.

My background is as follows: I am married and we are parents of six children. I started working life at 16 when I joined the RAF as an apprentice and qualified as an electronics technician. After 18 years in the RAF I took early retirement. I trained and qualified as a residential social worker but when the work strain conflicted with family responsibilities, I realized that I needed to move on. I retrained as a technical author and spent a more ’normal’ life style as an 8 to 5 employee. During this time I became involved in setting up Waste Not Want Not, a furniture recycling charity that also encourages and trains volunteers, and whose customer base is people in receipt of benefits. I also helped set up, and was a director of, Wiltshire Wood Recycling, a Community Interest Company that also encourages volunteers.

Alzheimer’s, when it appeared 3 years ago, made me retire my directorship at WWR, and left me with some time on my hands.

I had been aware of Doorway for some time. I had become more aware of alcohol and drug problems when one of my sons became a drug addict and dealer and eventually sentenced to prison. With this background in mind and my eventual retirement I got involved with Doorway. I thought that some of my social work training, my varied careers, and personal experiences would be of use to Doorway.

After completing the initial induction training I was invited in as a volunteer under supervision. I continue to be impressed by the amount of support and supervision available to all volunteers.

There was lots of support and debriefing at the end of each session as part of the normal routine. This I found to be very interesting and informative. I was also made aware that there was individual supervision available at all times.

What do I do at Doorway?

May I now point out that one of Doorway’s many positives is that no two volunteers are the same. What I do at Doorway, my background, and how I pass my time at Doorway is possibly unique to me (I hope), as are the attributes of each of the other volunteers.

What do I do at Doorway is a question I am sometimes asked and my flippant reply is often “I get a free meal for doing what I enjoy best, which is talking to people.” My main role is talking to guests and, probably more important, also listening to guests.

Our guests have a variety of needs which are very similar to most other people. – food and shelter, clothing and someone to communicate with. Doorway can provide all of these except the shelter. I was horrified when I realized that some of our guests often did not have a proper meal from one session to the next. I was even more horrified to realise that some of our guests did not have a proper conversation from one session to the next.

Although I have served an apprenticeship in washing up in the kitchen, serving behind the coffee table and issuing clothing , and still do these task, the thing I enjoy most is providing the conversation. If I were to go without human contact or conversation from Monday through to the Thursday , and then again through to Monday, I would be in Purgatory, I cannot think of anything worse.

One of my major highlights at Doorway, and one of which I feel proud, was to give a guest a straight answer when he asked me a question. I have a very sensitive nose and was well aware of his lack of hygiene and of his living conditions. In response to me frequently offering him a shower, an offer he never took up, he eventually responded by asking “Do I smell?”. He was shocked when I said “well, actually, yes”. He did not have regular access to shower or bath outside of Doorway; he was a heavy drinker and was unaware of the effect of his personal hygiene on other people. He is still a guest, takes a shower frequently of his own volition, and sees me as a good friend.

In my early days as a volunteer, a guest made the heartbreaking decision to part with her newborn child and offer the child for adoption. A very difficult decision to make, and I was able to help her from my own life experience of having adopted two children, many years ago. I was able to help her realize that adoptive parents are ‘normal people’. Seeing me as an example of an adoptive parent may well have ressured her that her child would almost certainly be well looked after.

Basically the guests are all individuals and are treated as such at Doorway. Each reacts differently to each volunteer in the same way as all individuals do, whether they are working, unemployed, retired, homeless, male or female, gay or straight.

They are guests, full stop.

Doorway to a better life – by Brian Tregunna

Chippenham based charity Doorway is attracting attention from the USA for the way its work with homeless and vulnerable people is improving lives. Doorway is an award-winning drop-in centre providing a friendly, safe haven for adults who are homeless or who have issues such as alcohol and drug addiction, debt, mental health problems or poor life skills.

When Mark Horvath, who works with the homeless in Los Angeles, was sponsored by British Airways to research the UK’s approach to these issues, he chose Doorway as the only centre outside London that he felt he simply had to visit. “Doorway is doing some amazing work and I just had to see it for myself. Now that I have visited the centre, met chief executive Lisa Lewis and witnessed what happens there, I am overwhelmed by the set-up.”

Homelessness is often a hidden problem in rural areas like Wiltshire. many people find it difficult to understand or accept that there is poverty and homelessness. Doorway deals with such problems by not only providing guests with the everyday basics, such as freshly cooked food, laundry and shower facilities, sleeping bags and clothing, but also by offering activities such as music, creative writing, art workshops and football; all of which aim to build self-esteem and teach new skills as a first step to improving their lives. The most significant role, however is as a signposting and befriending service in association with a range of partner agencies.

Lisa Lewis says: “Our staff and volunteers build trusting relationships with guests then guide them to access services such as New Highway (alcohol and drugs), Cranstoun (drugs) and Community 4 (accommodation) who regularly attend the centre”.

The set-up at Doorway, which relies heavily on fund-raising and donations to keep going, is probably best explained by Mark Horvath. “I was very impressed with how all the local support services engaged with rough sleepers during the session, but what blew me away is that when I walked into the main room I could not tell who was staff or who was a guest. Normally, when I visit a day centre I see all the homeless people by themselves watching TV, playing card games, sleeping in a corner, or just hanging out. At Doorway each and every table had our rough sleeping friends and staff and volunteers mixed together, it was gorgeous.”

It is sometimes said that people choose to be homeless but a recent Doorway survey showed that just 2% of guests made that lifestyle choice; even then, there were factors that influenced such a decision. The reasons for homelessness can be complex, but are often due to a breakdown in relationships at home, financial problems, mental health issues, alcohol and drug addiction. The average age of guests at Doorway is 34, but a third are under 25, reflecting the growing number of young people who are struggling to make a good start to their lives.

Few people in our local communities have to deal directly with the consequences of homelessness, but there is a cost to society that we all have to bear, whether through crime, medical aid, or welfare support. On a personal basis, homelessness is a dignity issue; it removes people’s choices of essential basics such as accommodation, food, use of the bathroom and privacy. Lisa Lewis explains: “Our work benefits not only the individuals who attend the drop-in, but the wider community, as guests are supported to move on in their lives, away from substance dependency and reliance n welfare benefits.”

Perhaps the final comments should be left to one of the guests who has benefited from Doorway’s excellent support. Steve (not his real name) is an ex-serviceman who lost his job and home. “People often say ‘it will never happen to me’ “, he says. “Well, regrettably it did happen to me. Doorway, as the name implies, is an opening to a new and better life, and without their help and support, I know I would not be in a position to say that ’yes, I have got a new life’”

Doorway is clearly drawing plaudits from far and wide for its life-improving work with the homeless and other people in need. It seems inevitable that such work will be much needed for the foreseeable future, in which case Doorway can expect to attract even more interest from other organisations that want to learn from their work. In the meantime, let’s be pleased and proud that Wiltshire is blessed with such an effective, forward-thinking service.

(Brian Tregunna is a volunteer at Doorway. This article was first published in Wiltshire Life, December 2012 issue. We are grateful to them for allowing us to reproduce the article here)