Homelessness

Will Quince Excerpts

Tuesday 27th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Will Quince (Colchester) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Islwyn (Chris Evans).

There is no inevitability about homelessness. In 21st-century Britain, there is no reason for anybody to sleep rough on our streets. It is perhaps too easy to walk past a rough sleeper and pretend that they are not there, and to think that the individual before us must have done something wrong—that they are a drug addict or alcoholic, someone to be fearful of and stay away from. We must break this taboo. Every rough sleeper is somebody’s son or daughter and every or any single one of us could be in that position within a small number of unfortunate life events. We must never forget that.

It cannot be said enough that one person sleeping rough on our streets is one person too many. In last year’s autumn Budget, the Chancellor announced £28 million of funding for three Housing First pilots in Manchester, Liverpool and the west midlands. That was such an important move, because the underlying causes of homelessness, and, in particular, rough sleeping, are incredibly complex. To suggest that they are attributable to any single cause is to display an unwillingness truly to understand the issue.

The more we can learn about what forces people on to our streets, the better we can target preventive support, yet there are some things that we do know. If we look at the 2016-17 Combined Homelessness and Information Network figures for London, we can see that among those who were interviewed the single biggest reason given by new rough sleepers for leaving their previous accommodation was the loss of a tenancy, yet that was not because they were evicted for antisocial behaviour or rent arrears. Individuals were asked to leave, most likely through section 21 notices from their landlords. The second biggest reason was relationship breakdown, which is not all that unexpected given that young single men are rarely considered a priority need unless they are vulnerable. We need to consider both issues to see how rough sleeping can be prevented, but it is more important to ensure that there are support services in place for those already sleeping rough on our streets.

The CHAIN report found that 47% of the rough sleepers that the network spoke to had mental health support needs, 44% had alcohol support needs and 35% had drug support needs. That underlines the problem in trying to tackle this issue: rough sleeping is not simply a homelessness problem. All too often we hear stories of individuals who have been helped off the streets and into temporary accommodation but who do not get the support they need to address the root causes so, unfortunately, they end up back on the streets.

Addiction can also affect people’s ability to enter emergency accommodation. In my experience, those sleeping rough on our streets cannot stay at the local night shelter or hostel because they have an alcohol or drug addiction. That is why Housing First is so important. We need to get vulnerable people off the streets and into stable accommodation so that we can help them with their underlying support needs.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

We do not have to go too far from here—just down to Victoria—to see people living rough on the streets. I often wonder why nothing has been done about them, and I see them regularly down there. There is another factor too. Homeless families have been exploited by landlords and are in overcrowded accommodation, and some of them are evicted because they cannot afford to pay the rents, so we should think about building council housing for a change as well.

[Will Quince]

The hon. Gentleman makes a good point. I want specifically to talk about rough sleeping, and he raises a point about wider homelessness. I have no doubt that colleagues across the Chamber will speak more widely about homelessness, but I want to talk about rough sleeping, which does not necessarily fall into the category of families. It tends predominantly to involve young single men and young single women.

We do not have to look too widely across the world to see that Housing First is working and helping rough sleepers with the most complex needs.

[Helen Hayes]

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point about Housing First, in that it is a well-proven approach to addressing the complex needs of rough sleepers. Does he therefore agree that three pilot schemes, none of them in London, represent a paltry approach from this Government to a practice that we know works and that should be funded to address this urgent crisis?

[Will Quince]

The hon. Lady, with whom I worked on the Homelessness Reduction Act, makes a good point. If she bears with me, she might like what I will have to say in just a few moments.

In my view, the Housing First approach is a common-sense approach. Think about it: how can we provide the support services needed to help rough sleepers with their mental health, drug or alcohol issues when the support workers never know from day to day where they can find those individuals? How do we address the general and mental health problems that are all too common with rough sleepers when they are under extraordinary pressure and physical strain from living on the streets?

Like the hon. Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes), I am pleased the Government have launched the pilots, but I think that it is time to go further and faster. I believe that the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government wants to go further. He is committed to tackling the issue and is determined that the Government will halve rough sleeping by 2022 and eliminate it entirely by 2027. But I want him to be bold and radical. If this was the first time that such a project had been undertaken, I would understand being hesitant about moving faster and the desire to evaluate how the pilots work, but they already exist in the UK and are used across the world. We should implement Housing First across the country as a priority. At the very least—and I look to the Minister on this—let us have a timetable for the full roll-out of Housing First programmes across England.

Most importantly, we must ensure that the programmes are fully linked up with local support services that are given the funding they need to help those sleeping rough with their mental health problems or addictions. Of course, that will involve spending money, but in my view that is a short-term cost. The study by the University of York and the Centre for Housing Policy found that Housing First programmes cost between £26 and £40 an hour, yet the potential savings are estimated to be as high as £15,000 per person per year if we include reductions in use across the NHS and in our police and courts services. So this is not only the right thing to do, but will save the taxpayer money.

Homelessness and rough sleeping in particular often have many complex underlying issues, which means that addressing them will require more than one solution. The Government have already made good progress on tackling homelessness, whether through the Homelessness Reduction Act—it was a privilege to serve on the Bill Committee, and I am delighted that it has become an Act of Parliament and will be implemented in April—

[Giles Watling (Clacton) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Will Quince]

Of course.

[Giles Watling]

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend. As a student, I studied sociology and I spent some time on the streets and at St Martin-in-the-Fields at the Crypt. I know that people went through a lot of hard times down there, and that was many years ago—decades and decades ago. This problem has been with us for such a long time but what we must do is think outside the box and always be flexible. Housing First is a great and a wonderful project, but we must go further and we must always look at these people, communicate with them and ask them why they are there. It is not always just about mental health or family breakdown. There are many reasons, but we must keep the line of communication open.

[Will Quince]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention, which has taken up a fair chunk of my remaining time—but nevertheless I thank him for it. We need to stop thinking of rough sleeping as simply a homelessness problem and, by rolling out Housing First programmes across England, linking them with support services and giving them the funding they need, we have the opportunity to transform the lives of the people sleeping rough on our streets. My hon. Friend is right that we need to think outside the box. I think that to a large extent Housing First is the answer, but we must roll it out faster and further. I know that the Secretary of State wants to do this, so I say to the Minister: let this be the Government that end rough sleeping for good.