Somerset Council is welcoming more Government funding to help ease winter pressures on homelessness and rough sleeping, as it launches its new strategy to tackle the twin problems.
Somerset will receive an extra £242,000 from the latest Rough Sleeper Winter Pressures funding round, bringing the total to just under £400,000 from the national pot.
The Council has just published its homelessness and rough sleeping strategy for the next five years which is being considered by the Executive today (3 February). Once approved, an action plan will be drawn up to put principles into practice.
The 70-page document acknowledges that while Somerset has a higher-than-average number of people facing homelessness or sleeping rough, the Council plans to build on work already achieved.
The main reasons for becoming homeless across the county remain loss of rented accommodation, parents or relatives no longer willing to accommodate, and domestic abuse.
Finding private rented accommodation is becoming harder. Tenants are getting into rent arrears or private sector landlords are not housing people because of a growing gap between market rent and benefit levels. Large infrastructure projects, while providing welcome investment, add to the pressures on private rented and temporary housing.
Introducing the strategy, Councillor Sarah Wakefield, Executive Lead Member for Adult Services, Housing and Homelessness, and Claire Tough, Chair of the Somerset Homelessness Reduction Board, say:
“Homelessness across the UK is rising, Somerset is no exception to this with high numbers of rough sleepers with increasing needs.
“There is some truly amazing work already happening in our county across all our partners, yet we know that we need to do much more to prevent homelessness.
“Our belief remains that fundamentally no-one should be without a place they can call home, and no-one should have to sleep rough.”
Since the peak of the Covid 19 pandemic, much has been achieved in the last three years in Somerset including:
- Stronger partnership working
- Better outreach services such as nursing and rough sleeper support teams
- Delivering innovative housing schemes.
But much still needs to be done to tackle challenges including the cost of housing, a low-wage economy, the ageing population, the rising costs of temporary accommodation and difficulty in accessing services in a largely rural county.
The Strategy sets out key principles and aims, and requests to government, such as ensuring local government has the funds to cope with pressures and demands, ending no-fault evictions and funding to build more social housing.
It was commissioned by Somerset Homelessness Reduction Board, a multi-agency partnership of services and organisations (all sectors) with a role in tackling homelessness and rough sleeping.
A consultation was carried out in late summer last year inviting Somerset residents and those closely involved in the sector, including social care, housing and public health to share their views. People who have experienced of homelessness and rough sleeping were also asked to provide their thoughts.
