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The London Homelessness Awards: promoting best practice and supporting innovation in the capital’s homelessness sector
The pandemic has thrown up major challenges for those working in homelessness. Last week’s awards celebrated some of the best work being done to help those who find themselves without a home, writes Neil Wightman
The past 18 months have been a period of intense challenges for everyone working in housing and homelessness as we seek to address the needs of homeless households and adapt to new ways of working throughout the COVID-19 response.
Nowhere has this challenge been greater than in London, where the housing crisis and its effects are more starkly felt and longer-standing than any other region of the country. The capital has 60,000 households, including 84,000 children, in temporary accommodation – two-thirds of the national total and an increase of 63% compared with 2011.
In 2019-20, around 25,000 households were owed a homelessness relief duty by a local authority, more than twice as many as in 2010-11. Through the Everyone In initiative, around 7,000 former rough sleepers have been supported off the streets and over 5,000 into settled, move-on accommodation.
Given the enormous scale of homelessness in the capital, the London Housing Directors’ Group – a professional network of senior housing officers from all 33 London local authorities – is pleased to support the London Homelessness Awards 2021, which took place last week, alongside the London Housing Foundation, Crisis, Shelter and the mayor of London.
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The awards celebrate the vital and valued contribution of the third sector and wider public services in supporting local authorities’ homelessness prevention role.
The awards were cancelled last year but returned for their 21st year, promoting best practice and supporting the innovation taking place across London’s homelessness sector.
As local directors of housing, we are determined to lead the charge in reducing homelessness in our communities. The awards present an opportunity to learn from innovative new approaches, with six shortlisted programmes.
The winner of the first prize was MyBnk: The Money House, which is an accredited youth homelessness prevention scheme. It targets care leavers and vulnerable young adults about to move into social housing. Over a week, trained experts in four flats across London teach participants everything they need to know to keep their tenancy.
They focus on survival money-management skills, understanding systems, planning for the future and reducing financial exclusion. It has resulted in a 64% drop in evictions for those at risk of becoming homeless.
Three further projects were also awarded prizes by the judging panel:
- Camden Health Improvement Practice is a specialist homeless GP service. Since 2015 they have provided a novel, innovative and evidence-based GP outreach programme. The impact has been to raise the life expectancy of homeless patients from 47 to 54 years, whilst the national trend has been a decline from 47 to 44 years of age.
- Southwark Law Centre: Homeless Patients Legal Advocacy Service. Southwark Law Centre works in partnership with Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust’s homeless health team to provide advice and legal representation for homeless hospital patients. The law centre’s specialist solicitors help patients with particularly complex immigration, housing or welfare-benefit cases. It also provides training and advice to the trust’s homeless health team and other staff, so they are able to support this particularly vulnerable patient group better.
- St Mungo’s: Westminster Street Outreach Service works 365 days of the year, from early in the morning to late at night to provide support to any individual that finds themselves sleeping rough in Westminster. When people are housed they are then offered bespoke support, so individuals maintain accommodation and do not return to the streets. This includes support with housing, health, immigration, access to benefits and reconnections, where appropriate.
Two further projects were also specially commended at this year’s awards:
- SJOG Hospitaller Services: Olallo House is an innovative intermediate-care service opened in 2008 in response to multiple tuberculosis (TB) treatment failures and preventable deaths among people experiencing homeless who haveh complex needs and no recourse to public funds. In addition to successfully supporting people to complete challenging treatment, Olallo is first and foremost a home, providing holistic, trauma-informed support that enables residents to realise positive changes and move on in their lives.
- Standing Together and Solace Women’s Aid: The Westminster VAWG (violence against women and girls) Housing First project provides permanent, independent housing and intensive support for 20 women experiencing long-term homelessness, any form of violence against women and girls and multiple types of disadvantage. Solace works to build relationships with the women and provide intensive woman-led support to help them maintain a tenancy and improve physical and mental well-being. Standing Together manages partnerships with a coalition of housing partners that provide units for the project.
As well as a first prize of £30,000, winners receive a range of business development initiatives, including communications and marketing support, training and further opportunities to bid for grants.
Congratulations to all of the projects celebrated this year.
More details about the London Homelessness Awards can be found at www.lhawards.org.uk.
Neil Wightman, director of housing at Westminster City Council and the London Housing Directors’ Group representative on the awards panel
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