History of Casework at Glass Door: How we’ve evolved

Glass Door Homeless Charity’s caseworkers have been a lifeline for thousands facing homelessness – offering advice, advocacy, and a route out of homelessness. 

For this blog, we chatted to Neil, our very first full-time caseworker. We got to hear about his experience working for Glass Door, why he’s stayed for so long, and what he wants everyone to know about homelessness. 

How did the casework service begin? 

In 1999, we started off by handing out advice leaflets signposting to nearby support. In 2005 and 2006, we hired caseworkers just for the winter season, but in 2007, we hired our first full-time caseworker, Neil. Then, in 2011, our second caseworker came on board. Today, our team has grown to fifteen dedicated caseworkers, providing critical year-round support to people experiencing homelessness. 

How our casework service has evolved 

Glass Door Homeless Charity is constantly evolving to meet the need, and as homelessness in London continues to rise, so does the need for expert advice and tailored support. We’ve expanded our casework service to help people overcome barriers to stability – from securing ID and accessing benefits to finding housing and using health services. In the last year, the team has worked with over 2,000 people, already supporting 356 individuals into housing. 

“Initially, we tried to expand the numbers to meet the demand that we saw, taking on extra staff for the night shelter season or forging new partnerships with other day centres, and making sure we had casework capacity to support guests of additional night shelter circuits as we opened them. 

As time went on, we tried to move away from seasonality within the team: the needs of our guests didn’t go away when the night shelters ended and we had to say goodbye to good colleagues at the end of one winter, only to have to try to hire again at the beginning of the next.”

— Neil, Co-Head of Casework

Hiring specialist caseworkers 

In 2019, in response to the EU settlement scheme, we expanded our casework team to offer specialist support with the launch of our Migrant Project. Glass Door’s Migrant Project works to support and advocate for those at risk of homelessness and destitute non-UK nationals, assisting people to navigate the enormous complexities and challenges of the asylum and immigration systems. 

Also in 2019, we hired a Multiple Disadvantage Caseworker to help us adapt to the increasingly complex cases we’re seeing. Multiple Disadvantage describes guests who are experiencing complex issues and have several different support needs, which could include mental health issues, drug and alcohol dependence, fleeing domestic abuse or having a long history of entrenched homelessness. 

“We started to identify areas we felt needed specialist support and take on caseworkers to address those needs. To begin with, this was around employment (as many of our European national guests at the time had the right to work but not for welfare support, so this was their only route off the streets) and tenancy support (as we saw guests being placed in private rented accommodation without any support, then coming back out onto the streets again).

But as the environment we were working in evolved, our Migrant Project and Multiple Disadvantage caseworkers were hired, once again adapting to the needs of our guests.

— Neil

Adapting during the pandemic 

In 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic hit and the government implemented its “Everyone In” initiative, we were unable to offer our shelter service and casework due to the restrictions in place. However, we quickly adapted to this change by offering single-occupancy accommodation, ensuring that people in need still had a safe place to stay. 

Creating gender-informed homelessness services 

In Winter 2023-24, we ran our Women’s Night Shelter for the first time, along with a dedicated casework drop-in service. The purpose of the women’s drop-in was to provide a space where women can access confidential, one-to-one support from a woman caseworker. After seeing the continued demand for women’s homelessness support, we provided a Women’s Night Shelter and weekly drop-in for the second time this winter. 

“My colleagues had identified the different needs of women experiencing homelessness, and found that the male-dominated day centres were often not suitable environments for them to access casework. So, we set up first a Women’s Group and later a Women’s Casework Drop-in to address this."

— Neil

As the need for homelessness support in London continues to grow and change, our casework service continues to evolve in response to frontline challenges and data insights, with the focus being on making our current services more effective and sustainable. 

Q&A with Neil, our Co-head of Casework 

Can you tell us a bit about your role currently and how it has evolved over time? 

I’m currently one of two Co-Heads of Casework: we oversee the work supporting the guests of our partner day centres and winter night shelters, seeking to move them out of homelessness and into settled accommodation. I have particular responsibility for overseeing our work north of the river (in Kensington & Chelsea and Hammersmith & Fulham) and take the lead with ensuring we continue to comply with the Advice Quality Standard. I’m also the charity’s Safeguarding Officer.  

I still carry out some frontline casework: one shift a week at a day centre, as well as working with a small caseload of guests with complex situations that we have been supporting, in many cases, for a long time. Otherwise, my role is now more to support and oversee the work of the team, which now numbers 15 people. 

It’s a far cry from when I started in 2007: I was initially employed just to work over the winter night shelter season.

West London Churches Homeless Concern (as we were previously called) only had one night shelter circuit back then and delivered casework solely at the Chelsea Methodist Church’s Community Drop-In.  

I was the only caseworker, and when the charity decided to keep me on to continue working with guests of the day centre when the shelter ended, the Senior Project Manager and I were the only two members of staff working full-time, all year round. It stayed that way for the next few years until we responded to the growing need by starting to grow the team, at which point I began to also line manage the new caseworkers.      

Why do you work for Glass Door? 

The charity’s Open Access policy has always been a big draw for me. It has meant that we can try to work with people experiencing homelessness who present to us at their point of need, rather than having to turn people away because they don’t have a Local Connection (which is a challenging concept for people who by definition have no fixed abode), haven’t been seen bedded down by Outreach Workers (which excludes people who may hide themselves away, walk around all night or sofa-surf), or fail to meet other criteria around support needs or immigration status. We may have to address all those issues, but we can try to do so in a way that comes from a position of openness. 

I’m sure the growth of the charity is one of the reasons that I have stayed so long as well, it has meant new challenges and, although it can be difficult, the work never gets dull! 

Above all, though, the main thing that has kept me here is the staff: we have always had an incredible, supportive and passionate team, both within casework and the wider organisation, who I have always been immensely proud to have as colleagues. 

What do you want our readers to know about homelessness in London? 

There are so many things I could say! I always think it’s important to highlight that the ‘visible’ homeless population, whether sitting on the pavement or asking for money on the tube, has such a small overlap with the thousands of people experiencing or threatened with homelessness that we support each year. With most of the people we support, you would never know that they were homeless if you passed them in the street, and many of them study, work or continue to carry out voluntary or caring responsibilities. 

Without wanting to get too technical, I think it’s also important to highlight the systemic issues that have a huge impact on the extent to which we are able to support people out of homelessness: whether that’s the lower rate of Housing Costs available to under 35s (that makes it almost impossible to find private rented providers that will take on young people on benefits), or the ever-dwindling access to qualified legal advice for people trying to regularise their immigration status. These are issues that we try to raise via our advocacy work. 

More than anything though, I would want everyone to try to remember that behind all the numbers, beneath the desperate state some guests may be in, within the groups of rough sleepers that may be coming together to our services with seemingly identical situations, every guest we work with is an individual, with their own stories and hopes.

Despite the trauma that may have led them to (or is perpetuated by) their homelessness, as well as helping them off the streets, one of the most important things we can do is to treat them with kindness.