Charities warn this Christmas will be tough for thousands of Australians

Charities are bracing for huge demand over Christmas as new figures show nearly 300,000 people – including 47,000 children younger than nine – accessed homelessness services over the past financial year.

Citing an affordability crisis within the private rental market and the historically low rate of the dole, the social services sector is warning the upcoming festive season will be particularly tough for thousands of Australians.

It’s a stark reality laid bare by two separate pieces of new research released on Friday.

The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) said in its annual report on specialised homelessness services that 288,795 people accessed help from an agency in the 2017-18 financial year.

Of those nearly 300,000 clients, 121,000 parents with children were among those seeking assistance. The data showed 62,000 were single mothers.

As the government rebuffs calls to lift Newstart or Youth Allowance, the data showed more than a third of all people seeking help from a homelessness agency cited those payments as their main source of income. Nearly 20% were receiving parenting payment while 16% were on the disability support pension.

The AIHW also revealed an average of 236 people were turned away from a homelessness service each day.

The top reason for a person to present at an agency was because they were facing housing difficulties (40%), followed by family violence (30%) and financial and employment difficulties (11%).

“Static federal funding, pitifully low Centrelink incomes and not enough social housing stock have created a perfect storm of increasing homelessness,” said the chair of Homelessness Australia, Jenny Smith.

For Paul Moulds, a Salvation Army officer, the findings of a separate but equally bleak piece of research were no surprise.

On Friday, the Salvos will release the findings of a poll that suggests 15.5% of Australian adults are likely to contact a charity for help with basic necessities such as food, power or other bills this Christmas.

“We’re seeing large numbers of people coming asking for assistance,” Moulds told Guardian Australia. “We expect to have a huge Christmas because it’s been a tough year for many, many people.”

The poll of 1042 respondents, conducted by Roy Morgan, also found 25% of people experienced anxiety over Christmas, while 10.6% suffered from social isolation.

For nearly 40% of Australians, Christmas was the most stressful time of the year, the poll suggests.

Single mother Victoria lives in Macquarie Park, Sydney with her three sons, aged 15, 12 and six.

After leaving her partner due to domestic violence, a decision that left her isolated from her devout Christian family which does not believe in marital separation, she has struggled to afford food and rent while living on the single parenting payment.

She is among the many Australians – possibly as many as three million, according to the Salvos poll – who are likely to seek help from a charity at Christmas.

“For a couple of years, I haven’t been able to buy presents for the kids,” Victoria, who did not want her surname used, told Guardian Australia. “To be honest, it hurts. I don’t care about myself, but I want my kids to be happy.

“I want them to have – not everything that other kids have – but just something, so I can see the smile on their face.”

According to the Salvos poll, 31.1% of people said they felt obligated to spend more than they can afford at Christmas.

“People still like to celebrate and the reality is without charity there are many people for whom Christmas would just be another day,” Moulds said.

“They won’t have enough money to buy kids toys or they will go into debt to do that. Many people don’t have access to credit anymore, so they won’t have enough money to put anything special on the Christmas table, it will just be the normal, basic meal.”