Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what recent steps he has taken to reduce the (a) level and (b) risk of homelessness among young people.

The Government is committed to reducing homelessness and rough sleeping, including for young people. The Homelessness Reduction Act came into force last year. It placed new duties on local housing authorities to take reasonable steps to try to prevent and relieve a person’s homelessness irrespective of whether a person has ‘priority need’ or may be regarded as being ‘intentionally homeless’, which of course includes young people. Last year we also updated guidance on the ‘Prevention of homelessness and provision of accommodation for 16 and 17-year-old young people who may be homeless and/or require accommodation’ setting out the respective duties of children’s services and housing services.

The Government has now committed over £1.2 billion to tackle homelessness and rough sleeping over the spending review period. Last summer we published the cross-government Rough Sleeping Strategy. This sets out an ambitious £100 million package to help people who sleep rough now, but also puts in place the structures that will end rough sleeping once and for all. The Rough Sleeping Strategy committed to creating a new social impact bond, the Young Futures Fund. This builds on the success of the Fair Chances Fund which ran from 2015-2017 and rehoused 1657 18-24 year old's who were or at risk of homelessness.