Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether the Government provides support for young people who have been arrested for rough sleeping under the Vagrancy Act.

The Government has made the unprecedented commitment to end rough sleeping within this Parliament and to fully enforce the Homelessness Reduction Act. We have already embarked on a strategy to shift the focus to prevention and move vulnerable individuals into multi-agency support, backed by £2.4 billion over three years.

The government’s ‘Ending Rough Sleeping for Good’ strategy published in 2022 recognises that young people face particular challenges in accessing and maintaining accommodation. The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities is funding £2.5 million is being provided through the Rough Sleeping Initiative 2022-25 to fund youth services in local areas. The youth interventions provide funding to 8 local authorities across England to develop specialist youth support such as outreach workers, prevention officers and specialist housing for those under 25. The Single Homelessness Accommodation Programme (SHAP) is also delivering over 2,000 homes by March 2025, including 650 homes for young people sleeping rough or at risk of rough sleeping and funding for wrap-around support tailored to individual needs.

Where anyone is arrested, Liaison and Diversion (L&D) services have been introduced into police custody, to seek to ensure that vulnerable people are identified and offered access to the help they may need. A key component of these schemes is to provide referrals to community treatment and support services and to provide advice to police custody staff on how best to support people with these vulnerabilities.

In certain circumstances, local authorities have a duty to provide accommodation to young people in their area aged under 18 deemed ‘in need’ under the Children’s Act 1989.