Terry works at Groundswell as the Equal administrator and lives in his own flat. However, having had problems with drugs for 30 years and been homeless for over five years, it has been a long journey for Terry to get back into a stable lifestyle and work.

Terry first came into contact with Groundswell while he was a hostel resident at St Mungo’s. Groundswell was carrying out an audit to improve client participation within the hostel and Terry got involved in setting up ‘Outside In’ (a residents’ forum aiming to influence decision making at the top of the organisation).

After a variety of volunteer work and training courses, Terry gained a place on the Enterprising Solutions project, also run by Groundswell, taking part in their ‘training the trainers’ course and was taught to train other service users how to participate in the services they were involved in. Having successfully completed the six-month course, Terry secured the position of office administrator for Groundswell itself.

“I had to do aptitude tests and an interview against 4 other applicants to get that job. I was also offered another job as well, so after 20 years of no jobs I found myself two in a week!

All the volunteering helped. Being long term unemployed is hard, you can do all the courses, but you need the experience - it’s Catch 22 - that’s why I did all the voluntary work. I’ve been doing even more courses for over the past year and a half – an Excel course and a minute taking course as well. I’m doing a 2-day SAGE course and I’m starting a course this week on Outlook Express.

I enjoy working at Groundswell. My initial contract has been extended for six more months, and I now work 28 hours, four days a week. The benefits situation is not straightforward though, I get working tax credit but then it dropped by £300 per month, making it a lot harder financially after the first tax year.

I attend a support clinic in Southwark twice a day which keeps me on the straight and narrow, as I’m an ex-heroin addict, this support has allowed me to stay steady and access training and employment. I’ve worked a year and a half and have only had to take 2 days off at short notice!

I’ve now got my own flat, through St Mungo’s ‘move-ons’. It’s a good location in East Dulwich, the only thing is it’s so big; I’m still living just at the top! In the future I’d like to be working in finance for a charity, doing something worthwhile.”