A NEW WAY OF ADDRESSING HOMELESSNESS PUTTING HOUSING FIRST

The weather is drizzly and cold when I meet Jo Prestidge, the Senior Project Manager for Housing First England, for a coffee in January. Just the kind of weather that makes you really appreciate not being homeless.

Homelessness is rising in the UK; by 25% for unsheltered homeless people (as opposed to those sofa surfing or in short-term hostels) in the past 10 years. These figures are often met with surprise; the UK has a welfare system, council and social housing available. Sadly, many people who are long-term homeless or unsheltered homeless have multiple needs that prevent them from getting the help they need.

Homeless Link is the national membership charity for organisations that work directly with people who become homeless in England. They are working to improve services and campaign for policy change that will help end homelessness.

“Housing First is a specific model” explains Jo; “it was pioneered in the 1990’s in New York and offers affordable housing as quickly as possible to those experiencing homelessness. Most importantly, it is accompanied by intensive, wrap-around support to help them keep their home and integrate into society.”

Dr. Sam Tsemberis was the founder of Pathways to Housing in New York City in 1992, based on the belief that housing is a human right. It was through his work that the Housing First model was developed and was primarily targeted at those who had mental health problems, issues with addiction, or both.

Jo informs me that these are significant factors contributing to increased homelessness in England. However, welfare support, our health system and councils’ homelessness and housing support still “provide the UK with a fairly good safety net for many people, it’s those with complex needs [a combination of, amongst other things, addiction and mental health issues] that struggle to navigate and benefit from the system.”

Traditionally, many homelessness services believe that certain criteria must be met before someone is ready for a home of their own; someone with a mental health issue may be told to tackle that first, or a drug user might be told to get into recovery before they are offered a tenancy. Sadly, for those on the streets with these issues, recovery can be extremely difficult, especially without stable housing.

The Housing First model assumes that everyone should have the right to a home, and provides the support needed to help someone not only keep their home, but to re-join society. A big difference with this model is that people are offered tenancies, rather than licence agreements, and that those tenancies aren’t conditional on accessing other services. This means that formerly homeless people have the same rights as any other tenant, compared to licence agreements; an insecure type of lease which means people have fewer rights and can lose their accommodation more easily.

It is the wrap-around support that makes a real difference and is the key to Housing First being a success. Support staff work holistically with small caseloads, usually around seven people, and work end to end with their clients – from the streets to when the client decides they want to end the relationship. This builds trust and helps form genuine connections. Their aims are recovery, integration and sustaining tenancies, and the impact is huge.

The effect of this work spreads far beyond the individual; it has an impact on the community and wider services. “When Housing First has been rolled out in an area, there can be noticeable knockon effects on services across the board.” Jo explains; “A&E, emergency shelters, hospitals, police, courts, prisons and more all see an improvement to how their resources are used.”

It is this that also makes a difference to the wider community; shorter wait times at A&E, more beds available, reduced use of the custodial system: increased engagement and assistance of homeless people with complex needs has a positive impact on everyone.

WHEN HOUSING FIRST HAS BEEN ROLLED OUT IN AN AREA, WE HAVE SEEN NOTICEABLE KNOCK-ON EFFECTS ON SERVICES ACROSS THE BOARD.

One of the biggest challenges can be the public’s perception of this client group “There is this unconscious idea of people being deserving or undeserving of housing because of their personal situation.” Explains Jo; “In fact people have become homeless for a range of complicated reasons, and ultimately they need effective support.”

The problem with society based on meritocracy is that the flip side of the coin means that those that don’t do well, deserve it. Sadly, the truth is a complex picture of childhoods of poverty or trauma and untreated mental health issues, often impacted by a reduction in care services in the community and closures of residential homes.

There have been many studies conducted around the impact and effectiveness of Housing First that make it clear, this is a model that works. The Government has backed Housing First and in 2017 announced £28m to pilot Housing First across 3 regions: West Midlands, Liverpool City and Greater Manchester. This exciting project was launched in 2018 and includes funding to measure external evaluations to test the model ‘at scale’ across England.

This project will be supporting around 1,000 rough sleepers with the most complex needs. “The evidence shows Housing First has an incredible rate of success in providing rough sleepers with the support they need to get off the streets and to rebuild their lives.” Said Housing Secretary Rt Hon James Brokenshire MP when making the announcement.

This is part of the government’s plan to halve rough sleeping by 2022 and end it by 2027. In Europe, Housing First has been successful in ending homelessness for 8/10 of their service users, whereas the traditional solutions in the UK have had only around a 50% success rate in keeping people off the streets.

It is only through the innovative thinking of Dr. Tsemberis that the Housing First model was developed; through engaging with the people he wanted to help and seeing the complex issues behind the situation, he has changed the lives of 1000’s of people for the better.

If you want to be involved, you can go to www.hfe.homeless.org.uk. Housing First services would benefit from support such as furniture, clothing, and appropriate, affordable housing and the team at Homeless Link are happy to talk to anyone who would like to get involved.

Laura Watkins, BITA Ltd