83 areas will share £30 million to boost the immediate support
available to people living on the streets and help them into
accommodation Housing Secretary Rt Hon MP confirmed today.
Councils across England with the highest numbers of rough
sleepers will receive a share of this funding to significantly
increase the support they are able to offer people now and also
those at risk this coming winter.
Funding will be used to provide an additional 1,750 additional
bed spaces for rough sleepers and an additional 531 dedicated
homelessness workers. The funding will also help improve
the co-ordination of services available to those in need and at
risk.
Among the projects this funding will cover:
- · Camden -
will receive £870k for a significant expansion of their outreach
team to deliver targeted street interventions focusing on hot
spot areas, as well as new staff to support rough sleepers to
keep their own accommodation.
- · Cornwall -
will receive over £430k for crisis hostel accommodation, cold
weather provision and support for the most disengaged rough
sleepers with chronic needs.
- · Manchester
City Council - will receive £418k to fund specialist staff to
work with young rough sleepers and offenders and provide
additional night shelter beds and supported hostel beds.
Councils will be supported by the Government’s new Rough Sleeping
Initiative Team consisting of experts from the sector with a
proven track record of successfully helping rough sleepers and
preventing those at risk from becoming homeless.
Housing Secretary Rt Hon. MP said:
“No one should ever have to sleep rough. I am determined that
more people living on the streets and those at risk this coming
winter get the help they need now.
“That’s why I am making £30 million available that will help
councils boost the immediate support they are able to offer.
Whether this pays for more beds or more outreach workers this
will make a real difference now.
“Many challenging factors lie behind rough sleeping, from mental
health problems to addiction and our long-term strategy to be
published this summer will outline how we plan to tackle them and
eliminate rough sleeping for good.”
This funding builds on significant Government action already
taken including the new Housing First Pilots announced last month
to get people into stable and affordable accommodation. In April
the Homelessness Reduction Act was introduced which will ensure
more people are provided with the support they need sooner. In
total the Government is investing more than £1.2 billion to
tackle all forms of homelessness.
Next month Government will publish its long-term Rough Sleeping
Strategy that has been developed in partnership with charities
and local government. It will set out a comprehensive plan to
halve rough sleeping by 2022 and eliminate it entirely by 2027 by
ensuring those sleeping rough have appropriate routes away from
the streets – and prevent them from sleeping rough in the first
place.
This latest funding will help local authorities using tried and
tested methods in their area such as:
-
Brighton – will receive just under £0.5m
for new outreach staff, psychological support and temporary
accommodation for rough sleepers.
-
Camden – will receive £870k for a
significant expansion of their outreach team to deliver
targeted street interventions focusing on hot spot areas, as
well as new staff to support rough sleepers to keep their own
accommodation.
-
Cornwall – will receive £437k for crisis
hostel accommodation, cold weather provision and assertive
outreach, which targets the most disengaged rough sleepers with
chronic support needs, offering a range of support to end their
homelessness.
-
Leicester – will receive £265K to
increase outreach provision, create a Rough Sleeper
Co-ordinator role and establish an innovative “Housing Led”
scheme enhancing options for those sleeping rough in the
city.
-
Lincoln – will receive £376K to increase
outreach and specialist support provision. The funding will
also provide 15 bed spaces for rough sleepers with complex
needs and create a Rough Sleeper Co-ordinator post.
-
Manchester City Council – will receive
£418k to fund specialist staff including staff who will work
with young rough sleepers and offenders, additional night
shelter beds and supported hostel beds.
-
Plymouth – will receive £363k to develop
a multi-agency team to deliver bespoke interventions for rough
sleepers as well as temporary accommodation and housing coupled
with support for rough sleepers.
-
Westminster – will receive over £534k to
deliver new Housing First units, to support rough sleepers with
complex needs get off the streets into stable and affordable
accommodation. The funding will also provide for 18 staff
including mental health specialists, bed spaces for women and
couples and extended night shelter provision.
This latest announcement builds on Government action to date, in
the efforts to halve rough sleeping by 2022 and end it altogether
by 2027. This includes:
-
£1.2 billion investment in a number of
programmes, including protecting core funding of
£315 million to local authorities for their work on
homelessness, and an additional £617 million in Flexible
Homelessness Support Grant funding, which councils can use to
work more strategically to prevent and tackle local
homelessness pressures.
-
Piloting the internationally-proven Housing First
approach – last month Greater Manchester,
Liverpool City Region and the West Midlands received the
go-ahead from Government to launch new pilot projects
worth more than £28 million to support rough sleepers with
complex needs get off the streets into stable and affordable
accommodation.
-
Introducing the Homelessness Reduction
Act – the new Act came into force in April 2018 and is the most
ambitious legal reform in decades. It places new duties on
councils to prevent and relieve homelessness, including for
single homeless people who are at greater risk of sleeping
rough.
-
A cross-government homelessness and rough sleeping
taskforce supported by a panel of homelessness
experts, charities and local government that is driving forward
a new national strategy to be published in July that will make
life on the streets a thing of the past.
-
Investing £9 billion to build more affordable
housing, including new council homes.
-
Up to £135 million of investment in housing for
vulnerable people including those most at risk of
homelessness or rough sleeping. The funding from dormant assets
will be directed to Big Society Capital for them to deploy. The
first investment opportunities in this programme will be
launched in the autumn.
ENDS
Notes to editors:
- A full list of the individual allocations for 2018/19 for
local authorities with high levels of rough sleeping is available
on gov.ukhere
- The Rough Sleeping Initiative Fund was announced on 30 March
2018. More details here
- The Rough Sleeping Team based at MHCLG is made up of rough
sleeping and homelessness experts, drawn from, and funded by
government departments and agencies with specialist knowledge
across a wide-range of areas from housing, mental health to
addiction.
- The Homelessness Reduction Act came into effect on 3 April
2018. Read more here: Homelessness
Reduction Act.
