February is LGBT History Month 2018!

It’s LGBT History Month so we’re taking this opportunity to think back to the now annual Hertfordshire Pride event that we’ve sponsored for the last couple of years. It was a fantastic day celebrating Pride at Gadebridge Park in Hemel Hempstead. We’re really pleased to be able to support the now annual event, which promotes LGBT equality in the county and puts on a great festival of information, advice, and most importantly – fun!

Alongside partners including Hertfordshire County Council, Herts Fire & Rescue, and Watford Community Housing Trust, our sponsorship helped to ensure the event could run again and welcome as many people as possible (over 2000!). And on the day itself, we were hanging out in the Health & Wellbeing Zone – dishing out thousands of stickers, rainbow facepaint and the odd bit of housing advice too!

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This is a really important cause for us to support – we know that many people still do not feel safe to come out to their local communities and that this has a huge impact on their health; we see a higher rate of mental illness among the LGBT+ community; and across the whole sector we know rates of homelessness are significantly higher among LGBT+ 16-25 year olds compared to any other group. We also know that someone’s housing situation can have a huge impact on this, especially for those living in shared or supported accommodation.

As well as supporting Hertfordshire Pride, we’ve been working with other housing and care providers (through the HouseProud network) to research the housing experiences of LGBT+ people in social housing. This research will help us gain a better understanding of the issues faced by LGBT+ people in relation to their housing, and make the case to do more.

We’re also continuing to train our people on LGBT+ issues relevant to their roles, and we’d love to hear about what your organisation does well to promote LGBT+ equality at work – you can tweet us @originhousing or message us on Facebook @OriginHousing.

Stonewall Housing run a weekly drop-in at our main office on Eversholt Street for LGBT+ people. They’re always here, rain or shine, so if you or someone you know would benefit from their free, confidential housing advice, head to their website to find out more information.

This month there are loads of really great events happening to celebrate and remember LGBT+ histories, so to find out what’s planned to happen in your local community, visit the official LGBT History Month website.

Posted: 08/02/2018 By Jon Foster, Community Development, and Lauren Rousseau, Communications  | 0 comments

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