Over the past 12 months, our organisation continued to deliver across the four focus areas of our 2020-25 Strategy to drive progress towards our goal of ending homelessness and ensuring people and communities in need can thrive.

As of June 2023, we are progressing well with our strategic areas:

Helping end homelessness in Australia

Youth Foyer development in Townsville, QLD

In July 2024, we officially opened Mission Australia’s first Youth Foyer in Townsville, Queensland. The opening ceremony was attended by state and local government representatives, Mission Australia staff and the Youth Foyer Foundation.

The new service is a beacon of hope for young people who are homeless or at risk of becoming homeless. Funded by the Queensland Government, this essential service offers safe accommodation and 24-hour support and supervision for up to 40 young people aged 16 to 24, supporting their education and employment goals while providing pathways to a brighter future.

We continue to advocate for more Youth Foyers and hope for the opportunity to deliver more across the country.

Midtown project in Macquarie Park

The first tenants have moved into their new homes in Midtown MacPark in Sydney’s Macquarie Park, an innovative collaborative project between Frasers Property Australia, state and federal governments and community housing provider Mission Australia Housing.

The first stage saw 259 social and 130 affordable new homes completed and open, with the launch attended by state and federal housing ministers and Mission Australia staff in April 2024.

There are 950 new community homes and 130 new affordable homes among 3,300 apartments planned, more than tripling the share of social and affordable homes previously on the site.

Midtown MacPark is set to be one of Sydney’s most dynamic, inclusive and best-connected communities. We look forward to supporting this vibrant mixed tenured community into the future.

Additional highlights:

• In April 2024, Mission Australia Housing took over management of 251 social homes from the Northern Territory Government in Darwin. This landmark transfer, the first of its kind in the Territory, ensures people living in these social homes will have access to our specialised housing support, and opportunities to connect to local community services and programs. We also established our first housing team in Darwin.
• In September 2024, we officially opened Willow House, Mission Australia’s new youth housing service in Dandenong Victoria. The five apartments will be home for up to 10 young people aged 18 to 21 who are being supported in their transition from out-of-home care to independence by our Better Futures program. Mission Australia purchased the property, with operational funding provided by the Victorian Government.

Partnering to strengthen communities

Communities of Focus

Mission Australia’s 2020-25 Strategy has a commitment to work with five areas to create strong, resilient and thriving communities. Our Communities of Focus flagship initiative is a place-based community-led approach with Mission Australia as the backbone, supporting many people and organisations to work together towards a shared vision for their community.

Announcing Whyalla as our fourth Community of Focus in December 2023 demonstrates our commitment to investing in, partnering with and supporting local communities in their efforts towards a better future.

In collaboration with community members, we progressed governance and project goals in our first three CoFs: Cairns South, Meekatharra and Maddington.

Over the past 12 months, we have worked within and alongside Cairns South, Meekatharra, Maddington and Whyalla communities, to understand the drivers of local disadvantage and support local leadership to build capacity, strengths and aspirations to nurture cohesion, collaboration, control and positive social change.

Community Chaplaincy

Our Community Chaplaincy program now operates in eight communities, including three new locations added this year: Whyalla in South Australia, Midtown MacPark in New South Wales, and Darwin in the Northern Territory.

Our Community Chaplains aim to improve personal wellbeing and to strengthen community in areas experiencing place-based disadvantage. They offer holistic pastoral and spiritual care and build strong relationships with local churches and community groups to further strengthen support for vulnerable people in the communities we work in.

A Mission Australia Chaplain is also available to support young people living at our new Townsville Youth Foyer.

Strengthening Communities Alliance

With the Strengthening Communities Alliance, a collaboration of community service organisations dedicated to place-based work, Mission Australia launched an influential Position Paper describing how community-led approaches support the systemic drivers of wellbeing and equity, and outlining recommendations for more sustainable place-based projects.

Supporting people in need to thrive

Alcohol and Other Drugs

Progressing our support for people on their journey to recovery and a brighter future, we continued to work with governments to deliver our community-based Alcohol and Other Drugs programs in New South Wales and South Australia, and through our residential rehabilitation programs across Australia.

Specialist Aged Care

Across our three specialist aged care facilities in New South Wales for people who are homeless or at risk, we achieved accreditation and raised our star ratings to four stars. We also continued to improve our governance and compliance. At our Annie Green Court facility in Redfern, we added six more beds. Mission Australia is dedicated to providing top-quality aged care so vulnerable people can age safely and with dignity.

Driving Excellence

This year, we introduced three new IT systems for Housing, Community Services and Aged Care, along with new Human Resources and Riskware systems. These systems are boosting our efficiency, compliance and communication. Most importantly, they help us provide better and higher-quality support for the people we serve.

At Mission Australia, we are committed to supporting both the people we serve and our staff to thrive. In the past year, we maintained our 86% staff engagement score. We also focused on staff retention, cutting turnover by 16% to 20%*. Strategies for improving turnover included moving more than 480 employees to permanent contracts for better job security.

In 2024, our gender pay gap is 3.3%, down from 4% in 2023. We are working to close the gap completely.

We are fostering a workplace culture that embraces flexibility, diversity and inclusivity.

New employee benefits now include:

• New revamped Employee Assistance Program
• Extra Mission Australia Anniversary Day leave
• Mission Australia Rewards program
• Servant Leadership training
• Global Leadership Summit attendance
• New leadership training and audiobook access.

By the end of the Strategy period, we will also have a new Enterprise Agreement for most of our people.

* This compares to AON Community Services Benchmark which is a combined result of 101 peer organisations from the sector. The AON Benchmark is currently 24%.

Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP)

Our 20-25 Strategy includes a commitment to reconciliation through our Reconciliation Action Plan.

This year we proudly completed our second Innovate Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP); achieving all 85 deliverables. As part of this RAP, we: 

We proudly launched our second Innovate Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP) at the beginning of 2022. We are on track to achieving all 85 deliverables by June 2024, with most in progress and some already delivered. As part of this RAP, we: 

• Celebrated National Reconciliation Week and NAIDOC Week across the organisation;
• Established a RAP Knowledge Group of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander staff to provide a forum for culturally appropriate advice
• Facilitated a co-design process to develop an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cultural Safety Framework for the period 2024-29;
• Developed an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander workforce plan, cultural learning strategy and cultural safety practice guideline;
• Recruited a National Manager Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cultural Strategy Developed an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander procurement strategy;
• Continued our support for the Uluru Statement from the Heart and the Voice to Parliament internally and externally and;
• Published a history project which is both an engagement with truth-telling and a platform to explain more about our name.

We look forward to developing a Stretch RAP for the next Strategy period.

Homelessness Research

This year, we released a Homelessness Analytics snapshot report.

We found people who are homeless are more likely to secure stable housing:

• The longer they stayed with our service,
• If they got brokerage*, and
• If they received more intensive support from our frontline services.

By understanding these factors, we can find ways to support people to overcome their challenges and help more people move out of homelessness and into a safe, secure home.

*Brokerage means small amounts of money we use to quickly buy essential things, like a mattress or new ID.

Evidence to Action

Using evidence to improve our services helps us learn and innovate. Our Evidence to Action process helps us regularly reflect, learn and make improvements based on data.

Here’s how it works:

• We provide data in easy-to-understand formats.
• We help our frontline staff and services review the data, understand the context, decide on key actions, and create an Evidence to Action plan.
• We then implement and track changes over time using the data.

Additional highlights:

In October 2023, we won the Excellence in Evaluation Systems Award from the Australian Evaluation Society, acknowledging Mission Australia’s ongoing dedication to transparency, accountability, data-driven decision-making and measuring our impact.

2025 and beyond

We look forward to building on the successes of our 20-25 Strategy in its final year ahead, pursuing our goal of ending homelessness and ensuring people and communities in need can thrive.

You can find more details about the 2024 Financial Year in our Annual Report.