This is similar to last year and far higher than the 164 losses estimated when National Records of Scotland began collecting this data just seven years ago. When you include hidden homelessness, including sofa surfing, the numbers are likely to be worse.
Deaths from drug use increased in the last year from 89 to 100 and accounted for 41% of all estimated homeless deaths in Scotland in 2023, up from 36% a year before. Of those who died, 79% were men and 21% were women.
We know from evidence that homelessness was for many of these men and women a late marker of interlinked factors such as poverty, trauma, poor physical and mental health, and addiction. The final insult was an early death following multiple missed chances to intervene.
Joined-up services can save people facing multiple and severe disadvantage who are most at risk of homelessness. We must rethink how we currently design, fund and deliver services to make it easier for people at the hard edges to access support.
New duties in the Housing Bill to prevent homelessness earlier and in a wider range of settings can also save lives – if they are properly resourced and implemented. So we call on MSPs of all parties to support the Bill in its Stage One debate this week.
We and other organisations in the Everyone Home collective have warned local authorities and the Scottish Government that people could lose their lives this winter if they are forced to sleep rough because of a lack of safe accommodation.
But these statistics once again show that the risk of death is ever present for people who are stuck in limbo in unsuitable hotel and B&B rooms. The causes of and solutions to these avoidable tragedies are well known. There is no excuse for inaction.
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.
Homeless Network Scotland has welcomed five new board members.
The new directors and trustees bring a wealth of diverse expertise across housing and homelessness, the wider third sector and local and national government.
They join a board of nine who are at the forefront of progressing the action we need to address the challenges people across the country face today and ultimately to end homelessness in Scotland.
We would like to extend a warm welcome to:
Maeve McGoldrick, Head of Policy and Communications Scotland, Crisis
Since joining Crisis in 2015, Maeve has led policy and external affairs teams across England, Scotland and Wales, working to deliver positive change for people experiencing homelessness. Prior to this, Maeve worked in the anti-poverty sphere and was involved in the development of welfare reforms in England.
Peter Menellis (individual)
Formerly in the IT industry, Peter has worked in frontline homelessness as a Residential Care and Support Officer with the Salvation Army. He has held positions with Ardenglen and Craigdale housing associations where his duties included input on good governance, housing law and finance, and was a member of the Fife Federation of Tenants and Residents.
Vicki Pirie (individual)
Vicki worked in the housing and homelessness advice sector after graduating from university in 2015 until last year, first as an adviser at Aberdeen Cyrenians’ drop-in centre, then as a trainee solicitor and solicitor, first at Legal Services Agency (LSA) and at Shelter Scotland Housing Law Service. Vicki currently works for the Scottish Government Legal Directorate as a member of the Equalities and Social Justice Team.
Sue Shone (individual)
Sue has for 30 years worked in social and private housing, factoring, homelessness services and local authority housing in England and Scotland. Sue has also worked as policy officer with the Chartered Institute of Housing in Scotland and the Scottish Government, where she helped to shape the policy landscape and showcase good practice. Sue has also held frontline roles and is currently Director of Housing and Communities at a housing association in Glasgow.
Laura van der Hoeven, Senior Relationships Manager, Cyrenians
Laura is a member of the senior management team at Cyrenians, a national charity and member of Homeless Network Scotland. Laura leads on public affairs, communications and fundraising functions and has experience of serving on Boards, as a trustee of the Scottish Book Trust from 2018 to 2023 and the Prison Advice and Care Trust between 2012 and 2016.
The Everyone Home collective has warned that people forced to sleep rough in Scotland could die this winter because of a severe lack of accommodation amid record levels of homelessness.
The collective has written to Scottish Government Cabinet Secretary for Social Justice Shirley-Anne Somerville MSP and COSLA Community Wellbeing Spokeswoman Councillor Maureen Chalmers voicing “serious concern” that the housing emergency will put lives at risk in the coming months. As things stand, there is simply not enough safe accommodation available for those who are homeless this winter.
The group, made up of nearly 40 third and academic sector organisations focused on housing and homelessness, issued a call for coordinated action as it warned of an accelerating crisis magnified by factors including cost-of-living pressures, austerity and inadequate social security.
Everyone Home has also for the first time written to the Scottish Human Rights Commission to ask them to urgently investigate this potential breach of government obligations to protect the fundamental right to life. Both Scottish Government and local authorities have duties under the Human Rights Act 1998 to take measures to safeguard lives.
In addition, the organisations have urged UK Home Secretary Yvette Cooper MP to ensure that the Home Office plays its part in preventing homelessness in Scotland. The Home Office must provide local authorities in Scotland with resources to ensure people granted Leave to Remain can move quickly into settled homes.
Everyone Home states: “Every person who is forced to sleep rough is one too many. Being left with no choice but to sleep in doorways and tunnels and parks severely damages people’s health and wellbeing, risks their safety and their lives, strips them of dignity and affects our wider communities too.
“In Scotland in 2024, no one should be left with no choice but to sleep on the street, and we emphasise that forcing people to do so at any time of year and particularly during winter puts their life at risk.”
It comes after Scottish Government statistics for 2023/24 showed that the number of people who slept rough prior to a homelessness application rose by 506 to 2,931 in the last year. That represents 7% of all households making an application and is higher than the pre-pandemic figure.
The statistics also revealed rough sleeping is on the rise across much of the country – including locations not traditionally affected to the same extent as urban areas.
Action to address the housing emergency now and in the longer term was top of the agenda at Scotland’s annual homelessness conference on 29 and 30 October, along with strengthening prevention and ensuring public bodies are equipped to deliver on their duties to address and prevent homelessness.
Maggie Brunjes, chief executive, Homeless Network Scotland said: “As we move into the coldest part of the year, we cannot allow an already bad situation to descend into tragedy. We need local and national government teams to work together quickly and effectively to protect lives by ensuring everyone has a safe place to stay.
“The bar has been set far too low for those at the sharpest end of homelessness this year and we cannot accept this. We need swift action to allocate and target resources to provide people with – at a minimum – somewhere safe to stay while they wait for a settled home.”
Delegates at Scotland’s annual homelessness conference on 29 and 30 October will be tasked with creating a route-map out of the housing and homelessness emergency.
The focus of Right Here, Right Now is what action taken now can ease the escalating crisis and what needs to happen next to create a better long-term future. Insight will be gathered through sessions and debates hooked on four urgent themes – Housing Supply, Supporting People, Rights and Duties, and Prevention.
Keynote guests at the event at Perth Concert Hall, delivered in partnership with The Salvation Army, include TV presenter, mental health advocate and motivational speaker Gail Porter, who has experienced homelessness.
Housing Minister Paul McLennan will address conference and be quizzed on stage by members of the All in For Change team who have lived experience of homelessness.
And in another must-see set piece, Alison Watson, director of Shelter Scotland, will interview Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar.
This year’s conference is the first since the Scottish Government declared a national housing emergency. Twelve local authorities have declared their own emergencies.
And it comes weeks after annual homelessness statistics released by the Scottish Government revealed rising homelessness applications, rough sleeping, and more than 10,000 children now living in temporary accommodation.
Sessions and debates over the 2 days cover issues including the housing emergency, the impact of hostile UK immigration policy in Scotland, making wider prevention duties in the Housing Bill work, and how to support increasingly pressurised frontline staff.
Helen Murdoch, Assistant Director Strategic Operations and Development (Scotland), with The Salvation Army, said: “The Salvation Army is proud to support this year’s conference, helping to ensure Scotland’s third sector continues to speak with a collective voice on the big issues connected to homelessness.
“In harnessing our collective will, we narrow the gap between great policy and what people are seeing and experiencing. The recent homelessness statistics provide added focus and a sense of urgency. Every 16 minutes in Scotland, someone becomes homeless.
“Over the past decade there has been an 87 per cent rise in the number of homeless households who have both mental health and substance use support needs. This event brings together expertise and experience in these fields and more, all vital to ending homelessness for good.”
Maggie Brünjes, chief executive, Homeless Network Scotland, said: “The people in the room in Perth will bring unrivalled expertise and opinion on what needs to happen to ensure people are prioritised, and the sector united, during a housing emergency.
“You only have to look at the line-up of guests, and to know the kind of supporters who come to the conference, to know that this is the right group of people to set in motion change for the better.”
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