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Abstract
This article offers a critical appraisal of the ‘New Labour' governments’ (1997–2010) much vaunted commitment to confronting and combating the spectre of visible rough sleeping and its associated street culture. It reviews the trajectory of policy initiatives and welfare practices concerned with engendering the social inclusion of homeless people. It subsequently interrogates attempts to shape the behaviour of people experiencing homelessness through the imposition of greater conditionality and invocation of an ethic of self-responsibility. It stresses the importance of considering the role of actively engaged local communities in governing homeless people and regulating homeless service providers. It does this using an ethnographic case study of homelessness and housing need in a small market town in the south-west of England.
Notes
1 Foreword to No One Left Out: Communities Ending Rough Sleeping (Citation2008).
2 Rough sleeping was identified as one of the first priorities for the SEU. The SEU, situated within the Prime Minister's Cabinet Office, sought to tackle a series of ‘entrenched social problems’. To this end, rough sleeping was selected as a high priority and a range of measures were announced aimed to reducing the numbers of people sleeping rough in England by two-thirds by 2002. A new body, the RSU, was set up to take over and coordinate all government in respect to rough sleeping under the auspices of the ODPM. The RSU was replaced in 2002 by the Homelessness Directorate that, in turn, was subsumed by the CLG.
3 For example, Thames Reach developed Shift, an innovative painting and decorating social enterprise, which aims to provide a ‘stepping stone towards financial independence for those who are most excluded from the job market’ (www.thamesreach.org.uk). Similarly The Upper Room through its UR4Jobs project has been at the forefront of offering specialist support to migrant workers and accession country nationals in employability and life skills (www.theupperroom.org.uk).
4 The Transitional Spaces Project was set up by Off the Streets and Into Work, and was funded through £2.1 m from HM Treasury's Invest to Save Programme (sponsored by CLG), the London Housing Foundation (who awarded the project £460 000), and additional contributions made by the Department for Work and Pensions. It operated from 2006 to March 2010 in London and Tyneside and sought to enable people to move into employment first, and then into their own home at an affordable rent level, with a private landlord (www.cesi.org.uk).
5 Under the HCIP, the ODPM invested £90 m of capital funding over a 3-years period (2005–2008).
6 For a critical and provocative analysis of the Foyer model of supported housing, see Allen (Citation2001).
7 Places of Change constituted a £70 m capital improvement programme managed by the Homes and Communities Agency. The programme had four key elements: (1) client involvement; (2) welcoming buildings; (3) motivated staff; and (4) empowering services.
8 As Neilan notes, the ‘scheme enabled the government to deport eastern Europeans if they had been in the UK for longer than 3 months, but are not, and ‘have no prospect’ of, working or studying (Citation2010, p. 3).
9 Administratively and ideologically the use of personal budgets to support and empower homeless people has bridged the New Labour and Conservative–Liberal Democrat Coalition (particularly given the 2013 target for 100% take-up of personal budgets in adult social care) divide. However, the point remains that the four pilot projects were commissioned and implemented under a Labour administration. The Nottingham pilot project ended on 31 March 2010, having run for 7 months. The Exeter and North Devon Individualised Budget Project commenced in June 2009 and concluded in March 2010. The piloting of personal budgets for rough sleepers in London was inaugurated in May 2009 and then ran for 13 months while the Northampton project has been in continual operation since April 2009.
10 Three levels of payment for personal budgets: (1) long-term complex needs up to £3000; (2) medium-term (up to 12 months)—up to £2000; and (3) new to the street (up to 4 weeks) up to £1000. See www.broadwaylondon.org.uk for more information.
11 On this theme, DoH (Citation2010) figures suggest that single homeless people ‘consume around four times acute hospital services than the general population… inpatient costs… rises eight times… compared to the 16–64 population’ (cited in Pritchard, Citation2010, p. 8).
12 The Coalition government, under the stewardship of Housing Minister Grant Shapps, overhauled the way local areas assess the number of people sleeping rough. Previously, only councils in presumed hotspots were required to conduct official rough sleeper counts—meaning that only 70 councils submitted information to central government. All councils across England will now provide information on rough sleeping. Under these circumstances, it will be for local areas—statutory partners working with voluntary organisations—to decide how best to gather this information (CLG, Citation2010b).
13 Section 30 of the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 contains police powers to disperse groups of two or more and also to return to their place of residence young people under 16 who are unsupervised in public places after 9 pm. The Act contains powers of arrest for failing to disperse, as well as the power to remove children to their place of residence from designated areas. These powers can only be used in areas where members of the public have suffered intimidation, harassment, alarm or distress due to the presence of groups and where antisocial behaviour is a significant and persistent problem.
14 Ministerial Forward, Vision to End Rough Sleeping: No Second Night Out Nationwide (London: CLG).
15 The Ministerial Homelessness Working Group recognises that ‘homelessness is more than about housing’, and is thus represented by the following Whitehall departments: (1) Department of Health, (2) Department for Work and Pensions, (3) Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, (4) Department for Education, (5) Ministry of Defence, (6) Ministry of Justice, (7) Home Office and (8) Department for Communities Local Government.
16 ‘No Second Night Out’ went live on 1 April 2011. It is overseen by the London Delivery Board and brings together the Mayor's office, central government, voluntary sector providers and the London boroughs of Brent, Camden, City, Hammersmith, Kensington and Chelsea, Lambeth, Southwark and Tower Hamlets.
17 According to the evaluation, ‘two thirds (63%) of new rough sleepers attending the hub were assisted to find an alternative to rough sleeping and had a positive departure from the hub into some form of accommodation. The comparable figure over the period for new rough sleepers who did not attend the hub was 15%’ (Broadway et al., Citation2011, p. 5).
18 Under the auspices of Homeless Link, 19 communities across England have received up to £250k to adopt No Second Night Out—www.homeless.org.uk.
19 To bring this discussion into sharper relief, it is worth noting that homelessness is once more on the rise and will most likely continue given the lagged effects of the ‘great recession’. As of the July–September 2011 quarter, 11 810 applicants were accepted as statutory homeless. This represents an increase of 6% on the same statistical period of 2010 (CLG, Citation2011b).
20 Comment made by RT Hon Tony Blair to the Labour Party Conference (Brighton, 1997).