In this month’s briefing: A year after the housing emergency was declared and with less than 12 months until the 2026 Holyrood election, demands for bold, urgent action to increase homes, address inequality and prevent more people becoming homeless are swelling to a chorus.
Two academic papers in recent weeks echo our sector’s call for radical transformation – not least from the Everyone Home collective, whose statement criticising a lack of ambition in addressing the crisis was cited in the Scottish Parliament Housing Emergency debate.
What these perspectives have in common is a plea for fresh thinking not only to address today’s crisis but also to put in place a strategy to build the homes we need to prevent homelessness for generations to come.
And on a grander scale, to create the fair, equal and dynamic country we aspire to be in reality, not just on paper, which means getting both the human and economic parts of the equation right.
You’ll find those papers, statements and other related research below, along with news, webinars and training opportunities in this month’s briefing, along with a subscription link.
Maggie Brunjes, chief executive of Homeless Network Scotland, on why the housing emergency can’t become a cover for deepening exclusion.
Picture two paths: one leads to an ordinary flat, a space to call your own, no different from anyone else’s. The other to a sleeping pod, a hostel room, a homeless B&B or shelter – a separate setup designed ‘for people like you.’
For those navigating homelessness, that second path might provide shelter, but it often comes with a catch – rules, labels, and a subtle message that your choices don’t fully count and your life not fully equal.
The first path, though? It’s mainstream housing, a key to stability, safety and a chance to decide and be who you are beyond your circumstances.
This is not only about roofs and walls. It’s about recognition, dignity, belonging and the radical idea (it sometimes feels) that no one’s life is less important.
Why does this matter?
When housing can’t be provided for everyone, as is the case in Scotland today, then the shape of ‘the next best thing’ becomes extraordinarily important. It reveals what matters and to whom.
Housing isn’t just shelter; it’s a space where life unfolds – and on our own terms. When we offer something lesser or distinct, we’re implying that not all lives deserve the same texture or possibility.
The housing and homelessness sector in Scotland is crying out for a political intervention that is inspiring, ambitious and passionate about housing in Scotland – and which wholeheartedly embraces three truths:
First, that homelessness is a housing crisis – and the most devastating outcome of a broken housing system.
Second, that most of us – if we want it – can thrive in an ordinary home as part of an ordinary community.
And third, that inequality is healed through reform and redress – not by deepening divides that scar the lives of people already at the hard edges.
We have a progressive homelessness sector in Scotland which has delivered major changes to modernise its response over many years. At the heart of that, an understanding that inclusion thrives in the ordinary, framed in a modern policy of prevention and rapid rehousing into mainstream homes.
Progress has included an intentional move away from services like large-scale hostels, ‘shared air’ communal night shelters, outdoor soup kitchens. Away from any initiatives that create stigma by ringfencing people affected together. And away from any services that label or reinforce people as ‘homeless.’
But there is a risk that this direction of travel is forced to retreat by a deepening set of housing challenges that will only mask the extent of deepening exclusion.
What are the big risks?
Currently, the ‘next best thing’ on offer to many people navigating homelessness is the exact reverse of what they need, a parallel system of temporary accommodation of the type and standard that can cause frustration, fear and anxiety – and with the sting of stigma too.
That councils are paying out millions to private operators to profit from substandard temporary accommodation should concern everyone. When fundamental housing services are an opportunity for profit, we send a message: that homelessness is not only an acceptable status quo, but a market to tap into. Literally banking on exclusion, rather than investing in inclusion.
The segregation, short-termism and typecasting that goes hand in hand with these services can have long-term consequences for people’s sense of identity, value and belonging, which for many eclipses any short-term benefit. And we know that these services often become a default, not a bridge, that harden into our systems.
Congregating people in close quarters builds stress, affects health, damages relationships and forces everyone’s hand around fundamental issues like ‘risk.’ Who isn’t at risk when people are held together for long periods at the most difficult time of their lives – in casework waiting rooms, in hotel rooms and B&Bs, in outside queues for food and shelter.
How did we get here?
Scottish Government already has policies restricting the use of unsuitable temporary accommodation and has made funding available to all councils since 2019 to make transitions that will ease and accelerate routes to settled housing.
But three forces have strained local budgets and plans and driven cascading setbacks for councils tackling homelessness:
Global factors: the pandemic and its aftermath, cost-of-living crisis, and the international displacement of people due to conflict and unrest.
UK-wide factors: including UK government fiscal policy, welfare benefit reforms and immigration policy and procedure.
National factors: an accumulating housing deficit leading to the Scottish Parliament’s declaration of a housing emergency in 2024.
What needs to happen now?
In times of crisis, it has been described that we should attend both to the most affected, and the most able to be assisted.
So we need investment in real housing outcomes for people at the hardest edge.
We need to go further to ensure that housing and support services offered are not just equal to but also seek to redress the extraordinary set of challenges and disadvantages that people have faced in their lives. Housing First works by combining ordinary housing with extraordinary support. And because it says, you belong here too.
We need to mobilise the transformation of shared, supported housing for the small number of people that don’t want their own place. This needs jointly planned and commissioned by councils and health and social care partnerships, losing the ‘homeless’ label entirely and helping to break down other ‘care group’ silos and stigma in this provision at a local level.
The most pressured council areas also need investment in a replacement plan for unsuitable temporary accommodation so that there is no commercial profit from homelessness in Scotland. Councils, housing associations and the third sector can provide better for less but need invested in to do so.
And we need to keep working toward the ideal housing system which provides an affordable home for everyone and a tight supply of temporary accommodation to support housing transitions for households that need a safety net in in the short term.
In the platforms we create for people with experience of homelessness, the themes of belonging and being treated with respect are among the most recurring themes. Because people experiencing homelessness aren’t a distinct, separate group with unique needs. Navigating tougher conditions than most, yes, but driving toward the same goals – agency, privacy, stability, safety.
Quick fixes may fill a gap today, but they can carve a deeper divide tomorrow, subtly shaping how we see ourselves and each other in the long run. Inclusion thrives in the ordinary – with thoughtful, inclusive action, the housing emergency can be a powerful catalyst for a fairer Scotland.
The Everyone Home Collective has set out a course of action for the Scottish Government’s Housing to 2040 Strategic Board about taking a people first approach to the housing emergency. Read it here.
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.
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.
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.
The latest Network Briefing brings news on the work of Fair Way Scotland, Housing First Scotland, and the Everyone Home collective. And you’ll find reports and research from Shelter Scotland, Rock Trust, Scottish Federation of Housing Associations, and more.
