Homelessness Prevention Task and Finish Group: final report and recommendations

Priority 1: Cross-sector culture change

Until we have an entire workforce across all relevant sectors working to prevent people from experiencing homelessness and sharing an understanding of how we will get there together (with people with experience of homelessness at the heart of the processes) we are limiting the possibilities that sit within these transformational changes. This is not about creating a shared value base alone, but requires embedding a person-centred ethos of prevention and support throughout organisations, that has shared ambitions, bringing people together from different sectors to progress these ambitions.

Action 1: Leadership and culture change

We must recognise and accept that, currently, not all public bodies, third sector and private organisations, reflect and embed a culture where the needs of people are put ahead of process or systems. Even amongst those who do, there will be many that do not put a spotlight on the prevention of homelessness. This must change at a systemic level, with a national lead within relevant services, working together to achieve this change. This will require steer, support and a strategy from the Scottish Government.

The following points offer a springboard to enable us to reach this:

• The proposals for a new National Care Service pose both risks and opportunities in relation to the prevention of homelessness. There must be planning from the outset on the cultural changes required, and how they will play a positive role in reaching the potential this new legislation offers.
• The value and transformative possibilities of the ‘Ask’ and ‘Act’ duties should be promoted by national government and national bodies to the local public authorities they oversee or represent. This should include the creation of messages which make clear to staff in those sectors the positive impact that this could have for improving outcomes; supporting the cultural changes required to embed these changes.
• Public sector leaders should consider and be guided by existing evidence on the barriers which have hindered progress since the Christie Commission: including short-termism in planning; inefficient use of existing resources; and lack of coherence across policy areas.^[2]

Action 2: Wider supportive action

We must move away from the preconceptions around homelessness, both in terms of the public perception around it being solely rough sleeping, and the wider perception, that continues to have a focus on male homelessness; instead moving to a gendered approach, with an emphasis on human rights and empowering people to access their rights. Crisis has completed significant work on public attitudes and homelessness^[3], providing a starting point for work to take place. To make a significant difference at a public level, a planned Scottish Government-led campaign would also pave the way to change. We would suggest input from gender specific services and human rights experts to aid this work.

Action 3: Putting people at the heart of decisions and actions

Any redesign of local services as a consequence of the new duties should be co-produced with people with experience of homelessness and frontline staff, to ensure systems and services are designed in a way that meets the specific needs of people in different localities.

Implementation of homelessness prevention duties is reliant on authentic, meaningful, and ethical involvement of people with experience of homelessness. The All in for Change Team - supported by Homeless Network Scotland, Cyrenians and the Scottish Community Development Centre - has been an important part of the homelessness policy landscape in Scotland, and we should continue and build on that approach. People also need to be fairly remunerated for their contributions, supported to ensure that the experience is beneficial to them, and see the impact of their contributions.

Other areas of work required:

• Linked with the above recommendations, the restructuring of local services should be done in collaboration across public bodies; working to design systems which put the service-user at the heart of how they are accessed, what they do, and the outputs. This may include exploring opportunities that are outwith using only local authority housing / homelessness buildings.
• All public bodies to which the new duties apply must have dedicated, trained, Homelessness Prevention Strategic Leads to support frontline staff to implement the new duties, with continuous training built into the role. The Strategic Leads will be key to embedding positive culture changes.
• Services to which the new duties apply should also consider introducing dedicated Homelessness Prevention Leads to work with individuals and coordinate links with housing and homelessness services, landlords, benefits services and other stakeholders. To take prisons as an example: this would be a dedicated Housing Officer or Link Worker based in each prison who works alongside prison staff to discuss housing situations/options with individuals, attend case meetings and liaise with other local authorities and partners as necessary.
• Embedding a culture of identifying and preventing homelessness in some localities will require changes to commissioned services and the formation of collaborative networks to meet future homelessness prevention duties. Where relevant, we would ask for a system review to start now, in anticipation of the new duties, led by people with experience of homelessness.
• Personal Housing Plans must be person-led to succeed. Choice and control are key, but equally managing expectations is fundamental in areas where choice may be limited. Creative solutions and partnership working will be required by those supporting the implementation of plans. Guidance should convey the wider parameters they can operate in to make plans realised. Where solutions are hampered by a lack of suitable provisions, this information should be collated and reviewed at a national level.

Action 4: Language

A reoccurring theme through the Task and Finish Group meetings was that of language. The word ‘homelessness’ carries a host of myths, stigma and misunderstandings, but it can also hold weight and power. Statutory definitions around homelessness have specific meanings in law, which convey rights. However, whilst the definition of homelessness in Scotland is broader than many people think it is, with people often conflating it with rough sleeping. It also focuses our attention on the acute problem at the point of crisis rather than when the early warning signs begin to emerge.

For true change, we require a focus on addressing myths and stigma associated with homelessness, broadening out people’s understanding so that we recognise all forms of homelessness, including those which are often hidden. The prevention duties will identify a wider group of people that may not have previously been visible to services and will highlight other routes into homelessness. Most importantly, homelessness exists because of a system failure.

Where possible, we should prioritise the use of terms such as ‘housing crisis,’ or ‘housing emergency’ to describe situations where people need support to avert homelessness, and terms like ‘housing options,’ ‘housing assistance,’ ‘early intervention,’ and ‘tenancy sustainment’ to describe the kinds of support that are offered.

• The Bill should be named to reflect the broad scope of the provisions, which are not just about housing or homelessness. For example, the ‘Early Intervention & Housing Sustainability Bill.’
• The terms ‘the homeless’, and ‘those who are homeless’ remove people from the scenario. Where the word homeless needs to be used, we would ask that ‘people experiencing homelessness’ becomes the normal terminology.

Action 5: A focus on young people

With no changes to the under 18’s element of the legislation, we cannot lose sight of improvements that could be made for 16–17-year-olds. Housing, social work, and other sectors must work better together both in good practice, as well as with budgets. We must continue to build on and learn from models of best practice for children and young people, for example Housing First for Youth^[4], the ongoing work and recommendations of The Promise, and the Upstream model^[5], whilst continuing to learn from the experts across Scotland and further afield.

We need to reverse the change that has been emerging where youth homelessness merges into other areas of homelessness, recognising that both the reason for a young person becoming homeless, as well as the solutions, are different in every case. Equally, recognition is required around the variations across ages and stages of young people (including care leavers); it is very difficult to compare the needs of a 16-year-old young person at school, who has been asked to leave their grandparents due to a lack of funds, compared to a 19-year-old young person studying at college, who has been asked to leave as a result of coming out, compared to a couple of 17-year-old young people who are expecting a child needing to move due to overcrowding. In addition to the very different scenarios, the age and stage each young person is at in terms of their maturity and life skills will differ much more than that of their adult counterparts. There should be a spotlight on youth homelessness across all sectors, with each exploring how to best ensure there is knowledge and understanding of the differences in access, needs and solutions.

Young people are likely to have a very broad range of routes into prevention, as a result of the implementation of Ask and Act, and it will be vital to have input and direction from youth homelessness experts, to ensure this is well executed from the right knowledge base.

Action 6: A focus on women

With domestic abuse being the main cause of women becoming homeless in Scotland^[6], the recommendations set out in the Improving Outcomes for Women and Children Experiencing Domestic Abuse report,^[7] must be implemented if a new approach to homelessness prevention is to be a success. Specifically, the Scottish Government must prioritise the implementation of the Domestic Abuse Protection (Scotland) Act 2021, which creates a ground on which a social landlord can apply to the court to end the tenancy, or interest in a joint tenancy of the perpetrator and transfer it to the victim; and requires social landlords to develop and implement domestic abuse housing policies based on the good practice guidance on domestic abuse for social landlords.

The need is not just in terms of legislation change, but there needs to be a spotlight placed on what housing options that are for women experiencing domestic abuse; these are currently limited, and frequently do not provide safe solutions for women (and often children). Continuing discussions with women’s services on appropriate provisions that meet the needs of people and their geographical settings, must be part of the plans moving forward.

In both the solutions for preventing youth homelessness, as well as women’s homelessness (which often includes children) arising as a result of domestic abuse, we already know what works - information that has already been collated across several Scottish Government and third sector documents. We need a Scottish Government spotlight and strategy to ensure they do not remain only as good practice on paper, and instead plan and implement solutions in line with these.

Action 7: Training

Across almost all of the Group’s meetings, as well as the stakeholder groups, the importance of cross-sector workforce training was continually emphasised. The key points with this recommendation are:

• Creating a national lead on training around the duties, to both support new ways of working across sectors, as well as continuing to ensure the ongoing development of knowledge and understanding in relevant sectors. This role should be created in advance of the new duties being applied in order to support training ahead of their commencement.
• There is the opportunity to incorporate training on the new duties into existing mandatory programmes, for example the Newly Qualified Social Worker Mandatory Supported Year; programmes delivered by NHS Education Scotland; and teacher training programmes.
• Prior to the legislation being rolled out, some training will be required to enable sectors to input to guidance and embed changes to reflect the need.
• Whilst there will need to be targeted training for housing/homelessness teams, and colleagues in each of the public bodies to which the duties apply, training should be cross-sector, with people from different services coming together, offering an opportunity to learn together and encouraging cross-sector working. This should become an ongoing part of everyone’s roles (sharing knowledge with the appropriate people across the sectors).
• Training provided should reflect any relevant actions highlighted in this document, for example including focuses on gendered approaches, young people, and care leavers. This will be especially relevant in terms of ‘Ask & Act’, the questions, and opportunities for change.
• Community Planning Partnerships should be considered as the lead to be responsible for committing to and planning such multi-agency approaches to training described above.
• Training must include information to improve general understanding of homelessness, highlight clear triggers and early warning signs to look out for, and improve frontline workers’ understanding of when someone’s homelessness has ended. Depending on the end product of the Housing Options Toolkit, this may provide an opportunity for other organisations.
• Training should be designed in a way that is trauma-informed, taking learning from the NHS Trauma Informed Practice training programme.
• There is an opportunity to replicate Housing Options Hubs to widen out peer learning and sharing of best practice across a wider group of public bodies and third sector agencies.
• The requirement for ongoing training is key to overcoming the challenges the prevention work brings. The shape and content of training required will be different depending on the varying roles across sectors.
• As mentioned earlier in this report, culture change is seen as one of the main priorities in ensuring the changes are as transformative as they can be. Training that embeds this change of culture should start to be rolled out well in advance of the changes ahead and remain a focus in the ongoing training and development across sectors.
• Training styles must be varied, with less focus on e-learning and more focus on people working together. Training opportunities bring more than the content itself.

Action 8: Empowerment through digital tools

As part of the culture change, we should look to empower people to be in control of the data we hold with / for / about them. Delivering a commitment to the development of digital tools that allow people greater ownership of the data public bodies hold about them, whilst also allowing information to be, with the individual’s consent, shared easily across agencies. The development of a single electronic record, as part of Scotland’s Promise to Care Experienced People, may support the sharing of data or those at risk of homelessness too:

• Scottish Government should commission a piece of work to look at data sharing across public bodies, with a view to enable data relating to individuals at risk of homelessness to be shared across public services, supported by informed consent.
• The new legislation will require streamlined referral processes supported by information on what services provide, such as through up-to-date service directories with both local and national contacts, or a designated point of contact who know what support is available locally.^[8]