Author: Jamie Milne

MSPs debate call for action on severe destitution

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A Scottish Parliament debate will highlight how people living in Scotland are experiencing severe destitution and homelessness because they have limited or no access to welfare support or housing.

MSPs will also hear about the practical steps that could be taken by local and national policymakers to address and reduce the harm people are suffering, set out in a new legal briefing.

Ending Destitution in Scotland – a Road Map for Policymakers, recommends action across seven areas including work, social security, education, and health and social care.

The Members Business Debate in parliament on Wednesday, 26 March will focus on a motion lodged by Scottish Greens MSP Maggie Chapman.

The motion notes the recent publication of the legal briefing by Lawmanity’s Professor Jen Ang, who was commissioned by Heriot-Watt’s I-SPHERE institute and the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF).

This briefing sets out a series of practical actions that Scottish Government and local authorities can now take, all within devolved competence, to end destitution. These cover a range of areas such as access to social security, to transport, to education and to health services.

Fair Way Scotland – a 3rd sector partnership that provides a lifeline to people experiencing destitution who have No Recourse to Public Funds or Restricted Eligibility for support – urges policy makers to include these actions in the next stage of the Ending Destitution Strategy.

Professor Ang’s briefing followed the Destitution by Design report produced by I-SPHERE and funded by JRF, which set out the severe damage caused to people in Scotland from lack of access to supports due to the hostile immigration system.

Researchers found that 93% of people supported by Fair Way were experiencing homelessness while 97% were destitute. Skipping meals and relying on charity for daily basics was common.

Average incomes were exceptionally low at just under £40 per week and a third reported no income at all in the last month. Two-thirds were not allowed to work.

Survey respondents reported poorer physical health, mental health and mental wellbeing than the general population and other disadvantaged groups.

The report also provided harrowing real life case studies of people whose traumatic experiences included being forced to sleep rough or walk the streets at night, experiences of violence and extreme poverty.

The report made a series of recommendations for local authorities and the Scottish and UK Governments to address the situation.

A key recommendation was for Scottish Government to exercise powers in devolved areas to the fullest extent possible to ensure everyone has full access to health, social care, education, social security, transport and housing.

Housing First: spotlight on Fife

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Fife Council lead officer for Housing Access and Advice John Ashford took time out to come to a Connect event in Stirling earlier this year, where he shared the local authority’s experiences of running Housing First. In this blog John again provides an expert view on the strategies that are working well in the area, and the challenges.

Fife has 89 Housing First cases, with 73 people in tenancies and 16 who are not ready for their tenancy or are waiting for a property. They have gone through the referral and assessment process before signing up.

Support is provided when a person is in temporary accommodation if the service user has not been allocated a permanent tenancy – or wherever they are residing (if sofa surfing etc) – this is a good opportunity to build a relationship.

We upscaled Housing First in March 2023 and now have four organisations providing support – Rock Trust for Youth, Bethany Christian Trust, Fife Women’s Aid and Turning Point Scotland. When the upscaling commenced, there were 29 Housing First tenancies – in just over 18 months we have increased to 73 Housing First tenancies and 16 awaiting the allocation of a tenancy.

One of our greatest achievements is the allocations process. This involves Housing Options discussions with case managers, providers and allocating officers in different areas.

We will identify two or three voids matching what tenant is looking for. This is not always possible due to housing demand but will look to identify at least one property that meets the preferences the customer has confirmed.

We encouraged the allocations officers to understand that we offer people a choice of home because that’s more likely to result in a successful tenancy. However, we do also attempt to manage the expectations that it is not always possible to provide multiple options on properties due to housing demand.

With any person experiencing homelessness we try to balance the preferences of the homeless customer against stock turnover, demand and number. But it also needs to be a realistic conversation.

People in Fife are more likely to be housed in a bigger town with more turnover of stock. There are challenges in the more rural areas – for example a small village might not have good transport links or a chemist. Tenants need to have support provision in those areas too.

Making sure tenants have access to other services can be a challenge for us and for the tenant. Operationally, we have great relationships with the support providers. We have a steering Group for higher end strategy and an operational Group. But once you step out of those groups it becomes harder to get buy-in. People tend to only come to those groups if an issue is raised about a tenant.  

If I could change one thing, I would go to other local authority services and say ‘this is how much you will save and reduce returns into your service through Housing First. This is how we can stave off crisis points for people accessing those services’.

I would love to see Housing First models for care leavers or prison leavers – programmes for different groups. At the moment, in Fife, this is not the case but I would like to see this opened out to give opportunity to more groups that require the support given in Housing First to have access to this.

Find out more about Housing First

Homeless Network Scotland event report: Staying the course in a perfect storm

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More than 70 colleagues joined a Homeless Network Scotland online event that explored the action we need to get out of the housing emergency while ensuring people’s rights are met and best housing outcomes are achieved today and in the long term.

Attendees and contributors from across councils, homelessness, housing, lived experience and academia lent their expertise and insight to Staying the Course in a Perfect Storm: Prioritising homelessness in a housing emergency.

Homeless Network Scotland's February event, Staying the course in a perfect storm.

They were asked to consider: What do we need to Defend, Direct and Divert to ensure we have the right systems, resources and values that will drive the best housing and support outcomes for people in Scotland now, while paving the way to a better long-term future?

Put another way, what do we protect, where do we bring clarity, and what do we need to do less of? And in what order? 

As a jumping off point, we used the ‘Defend, Direct, Divert’ route-map created collaboratively by 250 attendees at last year’s annual homelessness conference (find it here, with a conference report). We need to defend the culture change that’s been achieved in homelessness over recent
decades, with progressive rights and a solid plan for moving people on from temporary accommodation and into settled homes quickly.

We need to direct and influence each other on how to make rapid rehousing a reality, how to increase housing supply, improve prevention and achieve the outcomes in the Ending Homelessness Together plan. And we need to divert time, money and effort towards doing more of what works and away
from falling back on the failed solutions of the past.

Read more on the event and some of the key takeaways we heard in a short event report.

Read the report

New homelessness prevention duties need system thinking

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The Everyone Home collective and All in for Change have asked Scottish Government to target prevention funding toward small scale pilots that can enable close observation of pathways and processes that will need opened up to implement the new ‘Ask and Act’ homelessness prevention duties effectively.

This recommended course of action from the collective highlights that through action inquiry and a place-based approach, relevant bodies and local partners can enable learning on what it will take to implement the new duties and, importantly, to share that learning across

The collective and the Change Team set out a series of recommendations for defining the scope of the pilots and gathering learning in a new paper. Read it here.

Homelessness prevention pilots paper from the Everyone Home collective

It comes after the Scottish Government announced £4million of funding in 2025-26 to pilot and scale up prevention work. The collective welcomed the pilots and resources as an opportunity to ensure that the statutory prevention framework is robust for full implementation of the new duties.

Everyone Home also said this work will also ensure that local practice and national policy is aligned and strengthened around the foundations that need to be laid so the housing and homelessness system turned towards a prevention focus.

Everyone Home is a collective of 36 academic and third sector organisations focused on housing and homelessness in Scotland.

All in for Change is the national platform for people closest to the issue of homelessness in Scotland, through personal experience or working in direct advice and support roles. The Change Team acts as a feedback loop between people working in and experiencing homelessness now, and decision makers in local and national government and across housing, health and social care.

Seminar on intersection between violence against women and homelessness

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The Institute for Social Policy, Housing and Equalities Research (I-SPHERE) is hosting a seminar to present new research on the relationship between violence against women and homelessness.

Research Fellow Dr Lynne McMordie will draw on recent qualitative research in Northern Ireland that illustrates how abuse by intimate partners, family members, and strangers can lead to both acute and chronic housing insecurity.

Many women reported being forced from their homes – sometimes fleeing multiple times – even when they held legal tenancy or ownership rights. Systemic failures, including inconsistent police responses, inaccessible or weakly enforced protection orders, and exposure to further violence within homelessness services, further entrenched these cycles of violence and homelessness.

The seminar will take place online on March 26, 2025 from 11:00am-12:15 pm.

Sign up here.