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Government publishes Rough Sleeping Strategy deadlines
The government has published the delivery plan for its Rough Sleeping Strategy, including deadlines for a series of commitments.
Ministers launched their Rough Sleeping Strategy in August, as part of a pledge to halve rough sleeping by 2022 and end it by 2027.
Today’s document is intended to set out how the government will try to get people off the streets in practice, with a timetable for 61 different promises.
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It includes a requirement for councils to publish updated homelessness and rough sleeping strategies by winter 2019, with a threat to “take action” against those that fail to do so.
The government has also opened bidding for £11m of the Rough Sleeping Initiative Fund for council projects to help people into stable accommodation, after provisionally allocating another £34m in September.
It said the initiative will provide £64m to the 83 councils with the highest numbers of rough sleepers over the next two years, paying for 1,750 bed spaces and 500 outreach workers.
Housing and communities secretary James Brokenshire said: “No one is predestined to spend their lives sleeping on the streets. Yet, despite this, too many people still sleep rough on any given night.
“That is why we are taking action to provide support to help get people off the street this winter and set the foundations to put an end to rough sleeping altogether by 2027. This new action plan sets out the next steps to making this goal a reality.
“And while we are already seeing progress, I am clear we must go further than ever to achieve our ambition of a country in which no one needs to sleep rough.”
Other measures in the delivery plan include a study into the links between homelessness and LGBT+ people, to be published in summer next year.
New ‘work coach homelessness experts’ will also be stationed in all Jobcentre Plus bureaus by summer 2019.
