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Photo: Pete Burns (right) requires two men and women on a walking tour of Melbourne’s inner east. (ABC News: Jessica Longbottom)A new social enterprise in Melbourne is hoping to give people experiencing homelessness a assisting hand by education them to work as tour guides.
The enterprise is the brain child of Jo Jenkins who has worked in the employment sector for ten years, and got the concept of equivalent projects in London.
Ms Jenkins stated the project, called No Fixed Address, aimed to give tourists and locals a distinctive view of Melbourne.
“We’re delivering high quality walking tours we believe are a tiny bit gritty, a little bit off the beaten track that are meant to be demonstrating what Melbourne is genuinely about,” she said.
“I guess the added value to that is we’re giving disadvantaged individuals employment possibilities.”
The enterprise’s initial tour guide, Pete Burns, has the gift of the gab, but he has had far more rough instances than most.
Photo: Pete Burns guiding a walking tour of Melbourne. (ABC News: Jessica Longbottom)Back in 2011 his developing organization went bust.
“I went from quite much possessing what I would think about a pretty good lifestyle to quite significantly living under a bridge,” Mr Burns stated.
He now lives in social housing – but hopes this new job will give him a additional enhance.
“For me to stand here these days I am genuinely excited because I can see it’s benefitting me,” he mentioned.
“I can see so many other individuals who’ll in fact advantage by coming into a plan like this.
“My dream is … my own apartment and that will occur, it’ll happen through obtaining a very good attitude, applying your self.”
The tours at the moment traverse just one particular route, mapped out by Ms Jenkins and Mr Evans, but Ms Jenkins said she hoped to add much more guides and more walks subsequent year.
“It is attempting to function with those folks and receiving them some knowledge getting them self-confidence,” she stated.
“This may well not be operate for them forever but hopefully they will go on to some thing else.”
Nikki Boer, a single of the very first buyers to attempt the tour, suggested it to locals and tourists alike.
“I believe that every person must do it, even if you reside in Melbourne, you know it really is just fantastic to get behind an organisation that is about social inclusion,” she mentioned.
Photo: The walking track along the Yarra River in Abbotsford, in Melbourne’s inner east. (ABC News: Jessica Longbottom)Topics: travel-and-tourism, life style-and-leisure, community-and-society, homelessness, function, melbourne-3000, abbotsford-3067