Colchester’s Beyond the Box is proving to be a remarkably successful one-stop shop for local people in temporary accommodation, says Ellie Bland.
Temporary accommodation is vital for keeping people off the streets but comes with its own challenges. Essex-based charity Open Road has teamed up with Colchester Borough Homes – an arms-length management organisation set up by the local authority – to offer in-house support to tenants living in temporary accommodation.
Beyond the Box in Colchester was built and used as private student accommodation for the nearby University of Essex – however, as in other parts of the country, a drop in student numbers has seen accommodation left empty. Colchester City Council made the decision to make use of the empty space to offer tenants in need of temporary accommodation a place to live.
It’s important that people in need are given a safe space to stay, but most people in temporary accommodation are going through – or have been through – a difficult time. Many are vulnerable and may already be struggling with addiction, or they may be at risk of using substances as a coping mechanism. At Beyond the Box we’ve seen a real need for support for people struggling with drug and alcohol problems, and that’s what Colchester City Council’s partnership with Open Road offers. Tenants can attend the hub located at Beyond the Box to access the right support – getting those in need into treatment and delivering harm reduction, psychosocial support and motivational interventions right on their doorstep.
SOS bus
Open Road’s ‘SOS bus’ parks up at Beyond the Box once a month to offer a mobile drop-in service for advice, support, needle exchange and physical health checks, as well as sex worker support and packs. Having the needle exchange at Beyond the Box is incredibly important because it provides easy access to clean equipment and safe disposal of used equipment, as well as more interactions and conversations around safe use, options for support, and treatment. This in turn makes the accommodation a safer space in which to live and work.
Alongside substance misuse support, Open Road has its own housing support officer who helps people maintain their temporary accommodation as well as move on to more permanent living arrangements, whether private or council. By offering housing support and substance misuse support together, the hope is that tenants feel ready and able to start afresh by the time they move on – with reduced stress and better understanding of how to take care of themselves.
Open Road also encourages tenants to engage with other organisations such as Narcotics Anonymous, Cocaine Anonymous, Alcoholics Anonymous, Dual Diagnosis Anonymous, Smart Recovery and Essex Recovery Foundation. By building support networks we hope that, when the time is right, individuals feel comfortable exiting treatment, knowing they’re settled with a familiar recovery community.
Sexual health
Partnership working is an integral part of the Beyond the Box project, and we use our partners to enhance psychosocial support. Essex Sexual Health Service, commissioned by Essex County Council and delivered by Provide Community, have offered their services for our SOS bus – creating a mobile clinic onsite to offer sexual health testing, advice, and support. This has proved popular among the tenants who would otherwise put off such vital tests.
Open Road has also registered Beyond the Box as a project partner of Essex Sexual Health Service’s new Umbrella Project, which is aimed at supporting sex workers. This means that we can have care packages available for sex workers at Beyond the Box and can fast-track them into testing and support at the local clinic. Running this service as a drop-in suits the tenants well, as committing to a scheduled appointment can be challenging for those struggling with mental health or addiction.
Digital inclusion
Open Road has also been able to coordinate a two-day digital inclusion course at Beyond the Box with We Are Digital. Tenants are taught on a tablet which they get to take away and keep once they have completed the course, which includes things like creating an email address, writing a CV and searching for jobs. The course complements Open Road’s Individual Placement and Support (IPS) employment service perfectly, as tenants can be referred to work with an employment specialist who will come to Beyond the Box to provide support. Employment specialists look at CVs, help tenants to make applications, practise interview skills and get them set up with anything else they need, such as a DBS.
We’ve also been able to liaise with a community mental health team to look at increasing engagement and outcomes for dual diagnosis clients living at Beyond the Box who were consistently missing appointments with services. The feedback from multi-disciplinary meetings was that the service able to engage with the tenant the most was Open Road – specifically the worker placed in Beyond the Box. As a result, it was decided that multi-agency meetings could be held at Beyond the Box to ensure that the client has another opportunity to attend appointments such as medication reviews, giving them the best chance of stability and progress.
Remote areas
For many of our opiate clients, coming into the Open Road centre in the middle of Colchester means risking bumping into people they have history with or want to avoid. For this reason, we’re continuously looking at introducing appropriate clinics for our clients and have a few up and running in more remote areas for clients who would find it difficult to travel to us, or for specific vulnerable groups of people.
We’re continuously looking at ways to improve and progress the service we offer at Beyond the Box, and are now hoping to set up our own clinic. This would be for any tenants who are receiving opiate substitution therapy via our clinical partners Essex STaRS – the appointments would include drug testing, physical health checks and prescribing, with a recovery worker present for psychosocial support. The aim would be 
to improve ease of access to treatment and prevent clients from falling off their prescription or missing appointments.
Ellie Bland is a University of Essex substance misuse worker and Beyond the Box link worker