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Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick said: “Since the start of the pandemic, we made it a priority to protect rough sleepers through our ongoing Everyone In campaign, which has supported more than 37,000 people in total. “To build on this progress, we are making the biggest ever investment in longer-term accommodation for rough sleepers so they can have a secure, safe and comfortable home and rebuild their lives. “Councils have played an outstanding role in protecting rough sleepers throughout the pandemic and today’s funding is a further opportunity to work together to achieve our mission of ending rough sleeping once and for all.”The latest official figures show rough sleeping declined by a third due to the Everyone In initiative, which was introduced to get people off the streets during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic and supported 37,000 people in total. But a report released by MPs yesterday said the sheer number of those helped by the Government during the Covid crisis had “exposed the scale” of the UK’s homelessness problem. The new support announced today will mean homes are available in every region of England. Jenrick said the Government would make sure everybody who is sleeping rough or at risk of doing so has the opportunity to be rehoused in secure accommodation. Through the new scheme, specialist staff will be on hand to offer mental health assistance and substance misuse treatment.Today, the housing secretary will announce the next phase of the Rough Sleeping Accommodation Scheme.
— Sky News (@SkyNews) March 18, 2021
Join founder of The @BigIssue, John Bird, to discuss the impact of the pandemic on rough sleepers.
⏰ 7.30
📺 Sky 501 / Freeview 233
📱 Watch live: https://t.co/jCgTS4TrFX
New @CommonsPAC report on housing people sleeping rough finds the "Everyone In" programme exposed a rough sleeping problem much larger than previously acknowledged:https://t.co/phSlCIqFce
— Collective Voice (@collect_voice) March 18, 2021
Talking to Sky News about the new money, Big Issue founder John Bird said the Government’s Everyone In scheme was a “magnificent achievement” and showed that the country could do “incredible things if we put our minds to it”.
But he said the reason ministers were spending so much was because the UK had “never faced up” to its rough sleeping problem and focused more on the symptoms of the problem than the causes.
“[Jenrick] has given us a couple of hundred million a few months ago and now he is giving us another couple of hundred million,” he said.
“Isn’t it ridiculous the amount of money we spend on rough sleepers because we never face up to the fact that these people are a public health problem [and] a public health need? It’s a violation of human rights to actually be on the streets. All we doing in a sense is responding to the effects and never dealing with the cause.”
Housing and homelessness charities welcomed the new support."We can do incredible things if we put our minds to it"@BigIssue founder John Bird hails the govt's "magnificent achievement" in tackling homelessness through the Everyone In scheme which saw organisations came together to remove people off the streetshttps://t.co/4ozTbgvoxl pic.twitter.com/EBvo92Z5oK
— Sky News (@SkyNews) March 18, 2021
Fiona Colley, director of social change at Homeless Link, which represents homelessness charities, said it was “pleased” people would be able to move into safe housing.
