When we walk around our towns and cities the doorways are empty at night. No more huddled figures in streets and parks or derelict buildings.
In the countryside, people know they can find help in their area. They don’t have to trek to the cities to find accommodation and support.
When people face losing their home because of economic or personal reasons they know that there will be a roof over their head until they get back on their feet. They know they will get access to courses or guidance to help them overcome any factors that contributed to them losing their home.
People who travel to this country to work know that, if things go wrong with their job, they won’t be left without food or shelter. They will get a place to stay, food and guidance to help them get back into work or, if it’s just not working out at all, to get home to their family and friends.
Inevitably some people still have a whole series of things weighing them down, such as mental health problems or addictions, which contribute to their housing insecurity. They can be confident that they can get the right support by living in small-scale attractive centres. Here they are helped by people trained and qualified to a high standard and recognised for the challenging work they do. The support and guidance that they offer is focused on the aims, circumstances and potential of each individual. Their trusted lead worker focuses on emotional development and relationship building as well as practical changes. They can access all the services and support that person needs to help them transform their lives. They move on quickly and positively through more independent settings until they settle securely in a home. If they continue to need it, they receive support to sustain this.
Homelessness will be history when everyone can find good quality, settled accommodation that’s right for them for each stage of their lives.
These headlines for action set out to meet three ambitions:
PREVENTION
Ambition: To tackle the root causes of homelessness. Actions: To tackle the causes of homelessness systematically, reducing the inflow to homelessness year by year until it is eradicated.
SUPPORT
Ambition: To empower people to avoid or escape homelessness. Actions: To solve the complex and challenging problems of vulnerable and marginalised people so they are never homeless and they can change their lives for the better.
ACCOMMODATION
Ambition: An affordable, accessible and decent home for everyone. Actions: To increase the match between people’s need for housing and the accommodation that is available to them at a price they can afford to rent or buy. What is set out here is just a start, aimed to get the debate going. What’s needed is a national action plan, with cross party support, which will unite everyone who needs to be a partner in this ambitious enterprise. Its success will need joined up thinking, investment and action at every level of government, the third sector and business. But it will need something more: putting people at the centre. This calls for no less than a paradigm shift: homeless people no longer viewed as a problem to be solved, but through their experience, insights, capabilities and potential, recognised as an essential part of the answer.