It is a happy concordance of social hopes and political will which resulted in this beautiful project, which remains unique in Belgium. This Tuesday noon, despite gray weather, the Charleroi CPAS officially inaugurated its Maison Claudine Mahy, in Dampremy, the first temporary accommodation structure reserved for homeless women. “The findings are knownbegins the president of the CPAS, Philippe Van Cauwenberghe. There are more homeless men than women. They therefore occupy places in night receptions. In accommodation centers, priority is given to families with children. There was therefore a lack of a structure dedicated to single women. In operation for a little month, our house fulfills its missions, responds to requests and, I hope, will set an example to the rest of Wallonia and the Kingdom.”. Regional Minister of Housing, Christophe Collignon made the trip this Tuesday, May 21, to discover the place. Especially since it was a Walloon subsidy of €633,000, released as part of the “Territories zero homelessness” project, of the Recovery Plan, that Maison Claudine Mahy was able to launch its activities.
It takes place in the redeveloped premises of the former CPAS supplementary night shelter. Thanks to the commitment of 6 full-time equivalents, the House can accommodate twelve women, with a distribution of ten reception beds and two beds which can be requisitioned for emergency cases. Concretely, in a typical day, accommodation ends at 8 a.m., the CPAS teams support residents in their search for long-term housing, from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. Reception opens at 5 p.m. and accommodation starts at 8 p.m.
Minister Collignon recalled: “Losing your footing, following an accident in life, and finding yourself without housing should not exist, but it can, in fact, happen to anyone. Socially, I remain convinced that human dignity requires having a safe roof over your head”. Mayor Paul Magnette took the opportunity to reframe this inauguration in the more general context of equal rights between women and men: “It is a central struggle for the City of Charleroi. It involves the gendered analysis of all our political action, through the fight against sexual and intra-family violence or through more symbolic actions, such as the feminization of street names or parity of male and female artists present in our museums”.
The choice of the name for this new accommodation structure was therefore quite easy: Claudine Mahy, who died in 2017, lived in Dampremy for a long time. She was an author, often in Walloon, and a singer. Many remember her for her character of Mémé Loubard, who had marked the show “Pour La Gloire”. But Claudine Mahy, in addition to having been the first female driver of heavy goods vehicles in Belgium, was above all very involved in social struggles, in particular with the association “Un roof mon Droit”.
