Campaign Crusader - Bernard Fehon

CAMPAIGN CRUSADER – Bernard Fehon

On a cold winter’s night last month , Bernard Fehon was one of nearly 700 business and community leaders who slep t out on flimsy sheets of cardboard on the streets of Australia’s capital cities.

The attempt to experience first-hand what it is like to be homeless was part of the annual Vinnies CEO Sleepout – founded by Bernard Fehon – which raises money for the St Vincent de Paul Society.

“The CEO Sleepo ut is an experiential way to raise awareness of homeless issues,” Bernard says.

Sleeping on the hard, wet ground under an awning at Luna Park in Sydney , Bernard had ample time to reflect on the real-life stories he had heard from a number of people who had experienced and survived homelessness.

“If you went to a dinner and heard a speaker and then went home to your normal environment, it (would be) very different from trying to sleep all night on some bitumen.”

Bernard – who is a financial planner – first came up with the idea for the CEO Sleepout in 2005 when he was working on the organising committee of a St Vincent de Paul Society fundraising ball.

“There was something incongruous about having a flash dinner (to raise money) for homeless people,” he explains.

The first CEO Sleepout took place in 2006 in Sydney’s Parramatta , with 10 chief executives taking part . Last year 220 CEOs participated, raising $620,000.

This year, the Sleepout went National and CEOs from around the country raised in excess of $2.85 million.

Bernard describes the event as a “remarkable success” in terms of raising awareness of the plight of Australia’s homeless. “The flow on effect of what these participants take back to their businesses, their families and communities is phenomenal,” he says.

“Whilst you can’t fully experience what its like to be homeless… at certain points you get a taste of what it’s like to be on your own and disconnected from society.”

Bernard says he was drawn to work as a volunteer raising funds for the St Vincent de Paul Society because he believes in the work the organisation does to help those less fortunate in the community.

“I’ve become really passionate about that process of connecting people and making people think and hopefully helping people become a bit more compassionate in how they deal with one an other,” he says.

According to the 2001 Australian Bureau of Statistics census there are 104,700 homeless people across Australia. With the increased unemployment and economic uncertainty of the past year the new face of homelessness, according to the St Vincent de Paul Society, is families. The organisation seeks to increase its services to Australian families in crisis.

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