Who We Are
Why are we called 'Wintringham'?
The company honours the name of Tiny Wintringham, a homeless man who resided at the original Gordon House in Little Bourke Street, Melbourne. Gordon House was one of Victoria's notorious night shelters where homeless people were given a bed for the night.
When it appeared that Gordon House was to be closed, Tiny gathered support from government, unions and the media which resulted in Gordon House being rebuilt on the banks of the Yarra River. This new building has now since closed, but Tiny’s successful fight against what appeared to be insurmountable obstacles continues to inspire the company that has been named in his honour.
Established in 1989
The founder of Wintringham is its Chief Executive Officer, Bryan Lipmann.
Wintringham was established in 1989 in response to the frustrations of watching elderly men and women die in homeless persons’ night shelters, unable to access mainstream aged care services. Elderly residents were thought of as first and foremost ‘Homeless’ – aged care services wanted nothing to do with them.
Night shelter
It was decided to create a new Victorian welfare company called Wintringham and to build our own aged care hostels. With the active help of the Brotherhood of St Laurence and the Commonwealth Government and its Aged Care Minister at the time, Peter Staples, funding was secured for Wintringham to build three hostels for elderly, frail homeless men and women. These three became McLean Lodge in Flemington, Wintringham Hostel in Williamstown, and Wintringham Hostel in Port Melbourne.
Although Gordon House, Gill Memorial and Ozanum night shelters have now closed or been redeveloped, the problems of elderly homeless people unable to get into mainstream accommodation persist. In response, Wintringham is attempting to meet these needs by continuing with its program of building and managing additional housing and aged care facilities, while at the same time developing a wide range of community care and outreach services.
Bryan explored Wintringham’s humble beginnings and values with Waleed Aly in an interview for ABC Radio National, available below:
‘The sole motivating philosophy at Wintringham is that of social justice. We believe that all elderly people, regardless of poverty or lifestyle, have the right to live an independent and dignified life.’
Bryan Lipmann AM, Chief Executive Officer, Wintringham
A fire in our belly
Starting with a fire in our belly, our collective passion for social justice has endured. The principles that guided us in those early days are still the ones that we follow today. We believed then and do now that the right to aged care services is a fundamental social justice issue and should not be dependent upon a person's wealth, behaviour or religion.
Wintringham has also argued our clients are “aged and homeless” and not “homeless and aged” and therefore should be part of mainstream aged care funding programs.
We focus on 'battlers'
Our focus remains squarely on 'battlers' though we have found that the quality of our accomodation and services are such that other members of the general community also apply.
Additionally, we have created a subsidiary company, Wintringham Housing, a Housing Association registered with the Victorian Registrar of Housing, to manage and develop our significant holdings of independent living units. Uniquely, we reserve our housing exclusively for people over 50 years of age who meet the asset criteria of the Victorian Office of Housing. We also provide the support needed by individuals to ensure successful tenancies.
Gordon House in the 1970s