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Rough sleeping drops by 9%, official single-night survey finds
The number of rough sleepers in England has fallen for the second year in a row, new single-night snapshot figures from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) indicate.
The latest update on rough sleeping, published today, estimated that 4,266 people had slept rough on a single night in the autumn of 2019, down by 9% on the 4,677 counted over same period in 2018 and down 10% from the peak of 4,751 in 2017.
However, the figures remain 141% higher than at the start of 2010, when it was estimated that 1,768 people were sleeping rough.
The government has today announced £236m in extra funding to tackle rough sleeping and appointed Dame Louise Casey as an independent advisor to lead an urgent review into the causes of rough sleeping.
The cash will go towards offering Housing First-style ‘move on’ accommodation for up to 6,000 rough sleepers and those most at risk of rough sleeping, ministers have said.
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Prime minister Boris Johnson vowed in December to expand homelessness programmes and set a target to end rough sleeping by 2024.
The government said that 317 councils across England would receive money for homelessness services.
Rough sleeping figures are currently based on a single night count carried out by local authorities in autumn. Labour argues that the method underestimates the true number of rough sleepers, while Ed Humpherson, director general for regulation at the UK Statistics Authority, has said it is “limited”.
The number of people sleeping rough in London also fell for the first time in six years, according to the single night count figures, with 1,136 people estimated to be sleeping rough, down by 147 (11%) since the previous year.
The South West of England was the only region where there was notable increase in the number of people sleeping rough, all other regions were broadly similar or decreased, with the number decreasing the most in London and the West Midlands.
John Glenton, executive director of care and support at Riverside and chair of the National Housing Federation’s homelessness steering group, welcomed the fall in rough sleeping and the investment in Housing First.
But he added: “We’re still only back to 2016 levels of rough sleeping, and it will take long-term, strategic, sustained investment in innovative schemes and different ways of doing things to get the truly significant decreases.
“Housing First is an excellent initiative, but it is not the right solution for everyone and the new money should be combined with additional funding for other forms of relevant, well-managed service models, including supported, communal accommodation.”
Responding to the announcement of a review, mayor of London Sadiq Khan said: “Instead of wasting time and money with an unnecessary review, the government should look much closer at the impact that a decade of austerity has had, not just here in London but around the country.
“If ministers were serious about ending the blight of rough sleeping, they would reverse their punishing austerity and benefit cuts and invest in more genuinely affordable homes – which would reduce the number of people being forced out on to our streets.”
Update: at 13.30pm 27/02/20 a comment from John Glenton was added to the story.
