Manchester strengthens approach to tackle homelessness

Manchester has strengthened its approach to tackling homelessness but will need to ramp up its work even further to address the challenges of forthcoming welfare and legislative changes.

On update report on the issue provides details of extra beds being made available during winter and plans for the council to buy homes to provide more temporary accommodation for people who have lost their homes.

Manchester Homelessness Partnership was set up in 2015, bringing together a wide range of organisations and businesses to co-ordinate work to address homelessness in the city. Its work was given added impetus by an extra investment of £1.5 million through the Council’s City Centre Review to address issues of rough sleeping, homelessness and begging.

New services developed have included an increased emphasis on prevention, working with people before they lose their homes and reach crisis point, and on support to help people who have moved on from temporary accommodation to stay in settled homes.

Bernard Priest, deputy leader of Manchester City Council, said: “We all share the ultimate goal of ending homelessness in Manchester. Together with a wide range of partner organisations we have been working hard over the last two years to strengthen the services available.

“An increasingly important element of this is prevention, working with people at risk to help stop them becoming homeless. But where people do lose their homes, and in the most visible cases end up on the streets, it’s about providing structured support which will give them not just a roof over their heads but the confidence to move forwards in their lives so they can have a permanent, sustainable home. This means ensuring co-ordinated ‘wraparound’ advice and support to help them address the issues which contributed to them losing their homes such as poor health, substance misuse and debt.

“It’s an ongoing challenge and it’s not getting any easier. Welfare and legal changes and the impact of austerity mean the numbers of people becoming homeless, nationally and not just in Manchester and other big cities, are continuing to increase. We are determined to do we all can to help the individuals. But it will need concerted action at a local, regional and national level to ease the underlying causes of this situation.”