Category: Blogs

Blog: 5 years on, we’re still All in for Change

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All in for Change is a team of people with personal and frontline experience of homelessness who work to influence change in the way we address and resolve homelessness in Scotland. The Team first met in December 2019 to help close the gap between policy and action on the ground – to act as a bridge between the Scottish Government and people who access and provide support.

Since forming – and despite hurdles like the Covid-19 pandemic and the housing emergency – the Change Team has stayed passionate about pushing for change and ensuring that lived experience expertise is integral to policy making and culture change.

The Team is represented on the Homelessness Prevention Strategy Group (HPSG) and other government working groups, and contributed to the Ending Homelessness Together Plan. All in for Change has influenced policy around rapid rehousing and temporary accommodation, given evidence to the Scottish Parliament and played a major role in developing the Ask and Act prevention duties in the Housing Bill now going through parliament.

Through national roadshows, the Team gathers evidence of what is working for people experiencing homelessness and the workers who support them – and what could be better. The Team has set out 4 New Directions to end homelessness in Scotland and measures progress towards these goals.

To celebrate 5 years of All in for Change, Homeless Network Scotland’s Michelle Major and Change Leads Shea Moran and David Pentland – who have been there from the start – reflect on the value of the Team’s work and how it has grown to meet the challenging conditions we face.

Michelle: Thinking back to the first Change Team retreat in December 2019, none of us could have known the challenges ahead of us. We were filled with optimism, motivated by a new plan to end homelessness in Scotland.

We were ready to contribute to decision-making by ensuring the voices and realities of homelessness across our communities were represented and heard by those with power to make change.  

Within just a few months, the world as we knew it changed, with the Covid pandemic and lockdown. The way we responded to homelessness, and to rough sleeping particularly, was unrecognisable compared to the “business as usual” approach we were used to.  

Facilitating the team throughout this time was a challenge and also an inspiration – the speed people were able to adapt, and how quickly we could understand how the ever-changing landscape was impacting people experiencing homelessness showcased the true value of All in for Change – a mechanism to tap into what really matters to people and what really works in services supporting people.

While that feels like a lifetime ago, I believe that experience was formative for all of us, All in for Change included. It set the tone and showed us all what we are capable of.

Since then, the grit and personality of the Change Team has grown and evolved, and membership has naturally changed with time too.

But we’ve never lost the magic of the team, the ability to speak truth to power, to be cooperative and challenging at the same time, to always tell it like it is.  

Undoubtedly that’s down to the brilliant people who have chosen to join us, to dedicate their personal time or professional time to the team, to making things better and ultimately to playing a part in ending homelessness in Scotland. 

I truly feel that facilitating the Change Team is a privilege – personally it’s the first time I had the opportunity to get involved in something in its development stage and watch it grow into a vibrant team. 

Meeting the team each month at our Change Team retreats is always the best day of the month, where we are challenged to investigate the gaps in policy implementation, to learn, to prioritise and to influence at a national level.  

And going into our fifth year, we are ready to level up – our national roadshow where we record progress towards the Ending Homelessness Together action plan in 2025 will be stronger than ever with a peer research programme supporting it.  

We are ready to create solid evidence about what works and what matters to people experiencing homelessness across Scotland, and to work with our partners to make sure that evidence is able to influence the changes we all want to see – a fairer society where homelessness is not business as usual, and is responded to like the emergency it truly is. 

Shea: Mad to believe that the Change Team is five! It’s amazing to see how far the Change Team has come, how much we’ve accomplished in that time, and how far our reach has grown since that first meeting.

I never imagined that a group of frontline workers and folks with lived experience would have so much influence and respect within the sector.

Although I probably should have expected it when you’ve got someone like me helping out 😉

I’m still in the group because I think it serves as a great template for how engagement with lived experience and frontline workers should be done.

Everyone in the group is equal, people feel comfortable enough to express their opinions and know that those views will be respected or that they can receive constructive feedback or criticism!

David: I have been involved in All in for Change since December 2019. I had no real concept of the inner workings of our Scottish Government prior to joining the team. I have learned so much about policy and legislation as a result of my involvement.  

Some of the high points in my involvement include being part of the Prevention Commission where we came up with the concept of ‘Ask and Act’ as well as other homelessness prevention duties.

The roadshows were also a real privilege to attend and facilitate. Meeting frontline workers and people experiencing homelessness from across the country was a real eye-opener and really embedded some of the overarching priorities that the team had to highlight.

And they highlighted the outstanding achievements of some local authorities where despite obvious challenges, they were doing their utmost to make individual experiences of homelessness the best they could be given the circumstances. 

Lastly but most importantly, we couldn’t do what we do without the facilitation of Homeless Network Scotland and the large input we get from the Scottish Government.

We must go forward on housing rights – not back

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Mhairi Snowden, Head of Policy and Programmes, Homeless Network Scotland

It is vital that we keep the housing rights we have, and that the Scottish Government and councils work together to make them a reality. This is the important message of a letter from Everyone Home, a collective of almost 40 3rd sector, lived experience and academic organisations, to the Cabinet Secretary this week. As a group of people who work every day to end homelessness for people across Scotland, this Collective is clear that we need to go forwards, not backwards, on the right to a home.

The Housing Emergency is not, and never can be, an excuse or cover to water down people’s rights. This is because the right to a safe home is not something just for times that are easy. It is exactly when times are tough, when councils need to decide between one priority or another, that rights come into their own.

Rights in law are a way of identifying – and even justifying – the tough choices that need to be made and setting priorities that focus on getting the fundamentals right. They are a way of ensuring that in the midst of many clamouring resource demands, people whose voices are less loud don’t just get forgotten or ignored.

Our right to a safe home is not just for some people, in some places, or with certain circumstances. Instead, these rights are for everyone. They are about all of us being treated with dignity and value.

And when something is your right – not just best practice or kindness or good luck or you happened to ask on a good day – it gives you dignity and a voice in the midst of navigating difficult life circumstances in a complex housing system.

Yet the reality is that over the last year, councils have openly admitted breaching their duties to realise these rights over 7,000 times. There is systemic failure, says the Scottish Housing Regulator. What’s more, the Scottish Human Rights Commission are clear that the failure to provide safe shelter is a breach of fundamental human rights obligations.

The Scottish Government’s reputation on human rights is hanging in the balance after their broken promise to introduce a Scottish Human Rights Bill earlier this year. They have a job of work to do to convince people that what they say about wanting to be rights-based is what they actually do.

Ministers now need to urgently reassure people who are homeless, and the sector, that regression on housing rights is not ever on the cards on their watch.

Instead, Scottish Government and local authorities need to get round the table to find innovative and effective ways to consistently meet their statutory duties. Scotland has some of the strongest rights for people facing homelessness in Europe – something we can be proud of and should cherish. Now we are asking our policy makers to prioritise making these rights a reality.

Let’s talk about stigma

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A new Learning Lounge course launching on 5 December explores the drivers and impact of stigma. Homelessness Stigma; a conversation is an interactive, half-day course which will give you the skills and confidence you need to challenge the pervasive stigma around homelessness.

By the end of the session, participants will be able to reflect on the power dynamics in their work, identify stereotypes in representations of homelessness, use positive framing to reduce stigma, and learn about the barriers people accessing services face, including stigma.

In this blog, Homeless Network Scotland Associate David Pentland sets out why we need this course and how it can benefit everyone.

Stigma is pervasive and insidious, and it can be held by anyone regardless of their good intentions.

The judgments we make about people are often subconscious and rarely malicious. But we need to challenge our conditioning and fears, to overcome the bias we hold, making it easier to treat every person we meet or work with equally and fairly.  

To combat the unconscious bias we experience we must confront the issue head-on by conversing and exploring its nature, without any judgment.  

We want to help people understand unconscious bias. It’s really an unconscious reaction to fear, based on vulnerabilities that frighten us. 

It’s important to note that this course is not ‘training’ – that’s why it’s called ‘Stigma: a conversation’. It’s a space to explore in safety and get in touch with how bias works and identify some of the subtle directions it whispers at us from. 

‘Many people will be too ashamed to go into the homelessness system’

Stigma is everywhere and you see it in the media through the use of images of people sleeping rough and beggars to represent homelessness. Only a very small minority of overall homelessness involves rough sleeping. 

The impact these pictures has is that people experiencing homelessness who aren’t sleeping rough may feel they are falling into that stigmatised category. The more that imagery is used, the more stigmatised the majority of people experiencing homelessness feel.  

That can stop people from speaking up and asking for help. And it colours the way family and friends see them, because everyone reacts to imagery. Everyone gets locked into that image even if it’s not necessarily a true representation of where they are in life.  

This can transfer into a feeling of shame. That adds to hidden homelessness, as many people will be too ashamed to go into homeless system. Instead they’ll be staying with friends or sofa surfing.

This conversation also covers the equality aspect. There’s a well-worn saying that ‘everyone is two paychecks away from homelessness’.

That’s not true – the risk is not equal for everyone. In the session we expand on some of the life experiences and factors like a lack of social connections that make people more vulnerable to homelessness.  

The more of those experiences you have – like adverse childhood experiences, being a care leaver, having a background of poverty – the more likely you are to become homeless when you encounter financial difficulty.

When you add in factors like addiction, more avenues of stigma are opening up.

‘Everyone deserves an equal service’

Sometimes in services people cycling through the system experience stigma and end up being excluded from support. Staff can be burned out and can react badly. 

One of my worst experiences was entering a service in Edinburgh to be greeted by a member of staff saying, “Not you again? What is it?” I left and never went back!  That’s the harm stigma can cause. It turns people looking for support away at the door, with untold consequences.  

This course was created by a rough sleeper of 15 years who suffered severe and multiple disadvantage and lived in so much chaos no service would work with him.  All except one person.  

That person – that service – helped him to recalibrate his life. He went on to work as a frontline worker and even spent two years as a policy officer in the Scottish Government.  

We want people to come away from the session realising that everybody deserves an equal service irrespective of where they come from or how they present, and everybody deserves to live without the toxicity of stigma present in their life. 

Stigma is out there and it is killing more people who are homeless than you might think. Come join our conversation – you might help a lost cause get their life back.

Book your spot on the course

Introducing our new Learning Lounge training programme

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Hi, hello, fàilte, walcum to our Learning Programme for 2024. I am Laura the new(ish) Learning Lead for Homeless Network Scotland. Some of you may have already met me at our sold-out online training sessions or at commissioned workshops for your organisation or regional Housing Options hub. We have already delivered 10 sessions and trained 150 people since I started in May, wow!

I am excited to share with you our refreshed training programme and some exciting new developments in the pipeline. 

Since I started the role in May, the list of organisations on the Housing Regulator’s watch list has grown longer, and more and more councils have declared a housing emergency. Since we started planning the new programme, the Scottish Government has announced a nationwide Housing Emergency, and the Housing Bill’s proposed prevention duties have been debated in Parliament.  

What does this mean for our sector’s learning and development? Now more than ever, we need to understand the history and policy landscape so we can reflect on how we ended up here.

We need to learn more about well documented good practice and what works preventing homelessness in communities.

And we need to focus on where the system is not working for marginalised people and groups.

It is important that we share our collective knowledge with a wider set of connected services and community groups, beyond traditional housing and homelessness teams. 

Our Learning Lounge modules are designed to equip you and your team with the knowledge, skills, confidence and connections you need to effectively deliver your important work.

Our programme combines what members have asked us to develop, with evidence and research into what is working to end homelessness.

Training for Individuals 

Our open programme has three core modules running across the year, covering an introduction to relevant legislation and policy; what we know works to prevent homelessness; and understanding the impact of inequality in the homelessness context.  

Interactive sessions are held online via Teams and later in the year we will be returning to Glasgow city centre at your request. Each session provides an invaluable opportunity to hear from members across Scotland and learn from each other and our expert trainers.  

Whether you are a case worker, support worker, new volunteer or a board member, our three sessions will give you a good grounding by covering the evidence, good practice principles and challenges arising across the homelessness sector. 

Our current modules include: 

  • A Rough Guide to Homelessness Policy and Legislation 
  • Closer to Home: a place-based approach to preventing homelessness 
  • The Unequal Risk: an equality lens in housing and homelessness 

➡ Registration is now live in the Learning Lounge, and you can book a course today. 

Training for Organisations 

Our in-house programme focuses on building practical skills and helping teams to connect around innovative solutions. We deliver sessions online, in person or in a hybrid setup for organisations and community groups across Scotland.  

We work with homelessness service providers, local authorities and housing associations to design the perfect standalone module or cohesive training package.  

Our ten available modules help you to connect with the complex landscape, learn more about existing legal duties and act in a more person-centered way. 

Navigating the landscape in Scotland  

  • An introduction to policy 
  • Prevention and a place-based approach 

Complying with current frameworks and legal duties 

  • Housing First 
  • The Housing Bill and prevention duties 
  • Equality and equity  
  • Equality impact assessment 

Person-centred approaches 

  • Trauma informed approaches and psychologically informed environments 
  • Stigma and perceptions 
  • Lived experience and co-design 
  • Wellbeing at work 

➡ To find out more or discuss a bespoke module, get in touch with Laura to explore creating in-house training for your team or organisation.

What’s new and coming soon? 

There are lots of new developments across the learning programme this year. Here is a quick summary of what is new: 

  • A training module about challenging stigma and perceptions of homelessness has been collaboratively designed by Homeless Network Scotland Associate David Pentland and will launch on 5 December. 
  • An eLearning platform will be launching soon with courses and shorter on-demand webinars 
  • Specialist modules about health and homelessness have been requested and are being scoped 
  • The return of in-person training for all of you who love learning with a cup of tea or coffee instead of on Teams 
  • Tailored sessions designed for line managers, senior managers and board members are being developed 

If you have a training idea or module you would like to see us deliver in future, please reach out and get in touch with Laura. 

Training Funding available 

Don’t forget, if you don’t have access to an organisational training budget, we do sponsor some free open programme places and St. Martin in the Fields Frontline Network offer a training fund of £500 for individual training and £1500 for group training. Find out more about their eligibility criteria and how to apply for funding. 

We hope to see you soon, or dreckly as the Cornish would say (yes there will be more Cornish language sharing in the training slides for all the polyglots).     

Housing First in focus: Glasgow

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From 31 tenancies in 2018 to 318 total tenancies today, Housing First has scaled up in Glasgow, providing homes with flexible support for people whose homelessness is complex and often tied up with issues including mental health and addiction.

The city’s Health and Social Care Partnership (HSCP) works successfully with Housing Associations to provide Housing First homes, with a current target of 600 tenancies.

A sample of 20 tenants shows that prior to their tenancies they made a combined 220 homelessness applications, some dating as far back as 1994 – Housing First clearly works to keep people facing overlapping disadvantage in tenancies.

Eleanor Lee, Principal Officer for Housing First at Glasgow City Health and Social Care Partnership, says the city has learned on the job and refined its processes over the last six years in the face of unprecedented pressures. Here, she sets out how the system operates to ensure people’s wellbeing needs are met.

My team consists of a team leader, senior addiction practitioner, eight assessment officers and a resource worker supporting governance.

The first step is a referral to Housing First – anyone can refer you and you can self-refer. A crucial new addition at this stage is an in-depth pre-screening of candidates, looking at their historical data on our systems.

The idea is to assess risk, look at how systems have responded to a person’s needs and trauma, what needs to happen this time to keep a person in a tenancy. A care manager has input from the start of the process. The assessment is also available across the HSPC systems, meaning applicants don’t have to repeat their story again and again.

We then link up with a Registered Social Landlord who has accepted the tenant to discuss matching their needs to a tenancy and raising any potential issues.

Successful applicants sometimes have to wait for upgrades to a void and it can be a challenge keeping them stable in temporary accommodation while they wait. But some of our tenancies have been out of this world. Low-level, great condition houses. It’s not all perfect but there’s really been an effort here to make the best offer.

A care plan is then put in place. When someone is moving into a new type of tenancy, wraparound support and building a relationship with a support worker is critical.

In Glasgow we recognise that a good relationship with a Housing Officer is important too, and they will meet the tenant before the tenancy. The tenant is more likely to flag problems if they have a rapport – say the water’s off, they might not tell their care manager or support worker.

Landlords often add in a bit extra – a starter pack, or fire-resistant bedding if a fire risk has been identified – instead of refusing housing which would have happened in the past. The aim is to prevent issues arising in the first place.

Once the tenant has moved in, six and 12-week reviews are carried out with them, in the property, to ensure they’re safe and well before we sign-off on the tenancy. They may be vulnerable to exploitation or self-harm, like cuckooing and hoarding. There is a part missing though. When your life has been chaos for 20 years you might not know how to run your home, how to keep it clean and tidy. People should have the opportunity to learn these skills before their tenancy starts.

During the tenancy, a cycle of care managers will be on board to get responses within the HSPC to things that aren’t going right – this is where a whole systems approach comes in.

There is an issue around mental health services; our shared understanding of the issues is unclear. Sometimes we’ll see a tenant struggling mentally even after a community practice nurse has said they’re fine. We’ll try to look back in whether through the adult support protection route, the care manager, a service review – whatever needs to be done.

Quite often when we start assessment people have burnt their boats with their family, and after coming into Housing First they re-establish connections.

One tenant was in the Bellgrove Hotel hostel in Glasgow for 14 years. His marriage broke down, he was separated from his wife and kids, he lost his job, was drinking heavily and had anger management issues. He now needs no support and has re-engaged with his family. He told us: “I’m not angry at life now – I’m happy with life”. Others have moved on in recovery, they’re going to university, taking courses.

The final stage is the overview. We have a weekly live caseload with updates on cases from the support organisations, and a fortnightly case management meeting to highlight concerns about tenants.

We work with the wider homelessness system in Glasgow, liaise with RSLs and provide six-monthly Scottish Government monitoring report with qualitative information about tenants, looking at their journeys rather than seeing people as numbers. Reporting includes within the GCCHSPC and to the Integrated Joint Board. There is a huge amount of governance and reporting but you need to understand how things are going.

During Covid there were no lets and we’ve not properly recovered. There’s big pressure on homelessness from leave to remain cases, from indigenous presentations, and a downturn in availability of housing. Referrals are more than double the 318 tenancies.

But looking at the statistics, of the 61 people in tenancies in 2021/22, 45 are still there, which is remarkable. You can see how the system of assessment is improving, support is improving and having an impact. It’s amazing to see.