The charity worker

We have had to close the doors to the mums who use the Magpie Project, a community project for mums with pre-school children who are homeless or at risk of being homeless. We have a lovely playground, toys they don’t have at home, legal casework advice, food, and a cup of tea. There is also a lot of physical contact and hugging here! There are women who say this is the only place they get touched, except by their children.

The first 1000 days of a child’s life are vitally important. You can damage their chances in life if you don’t give them what they need. It’s not just about avoiding trauma, they need love, care, play, safety, socialisation. I do worry about them in isolation. A lot of them live in a room the size of a parking space, and share kitchens and bathrooms so it’s tough that they are stuck indoors.

We’re trying to recreate the feeling of community on Whatsapp but it’s not the same and the women are really missing coming here. They are really worried. Some of them are living with people who might be coughing but still use the communal spaces. Public Health England are giving advice that local authorities can’t follow without re-housing all these people.

In some ways the change isn’t too hard for them, because they have been living with poverty and uncertainty for a long time. These women always live with things that people are complaining about now, like not being able to buy food or not having enough space, living with uncertainty.

While our doors are closed we’re focussing instead on supporting the mums and children in their homes. We’re delivering food and play parcels. 

When this is over, I hope things don’t go back to normal. We’re seeing that we all connected and we have to look after everybody. All the local homeless people were housed overnight. If that can happen, we should also try and make life better for these mums.