Extra funds initially announced in last month’s Budget
The government has set out how it plans to spend £1bn of funding to address homelessness over the next year.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced an additional £233m in cash for homelessness prevention in last month’s Budget, taking the total planned spend to ten figures.
Now the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government has set out how it plans to spend the money over the course of the year.
The majority of the cash (£633m) will be spent on the Homelessness Prevention Grant, which will be £192m higher than this year.
The grant supports councils to prevent homelessness and provide temporary accommodation for families who recently became homeless.
Just under £186m will go to the Rough Sleeping Prevention and Recovery Grant, which consolidates the main grants for rough sleeping and single homelessness into a single pot.
Of the remaining money, £59m will go to the Rough Sleeping Drug and Alcohol Treatment Grant and more than £37m will be spent on the Rough Sleeping Accommodation Programme.
Another £10m will go to the Changing Futures Programmes, which offer long-term support for adults experiencing multiple disadvantage, £7.6m will go to grant to strengthen capacity in the voluntary sector, and £5m will be spent on Emergency Accommodation Reduction Pilots.
Minister for homelessness, Rushanara Ali, said: “We have inherited the worst housing crisis in living memory that has left far too many families trapped in temporary accommodation with no end in sight and soaring numbers of people sleeping rough on our streets.
>> Read more: Number of households with children in temporary accommodation reaches record high
“This is the dire legacy we have inherited as a government, and we are fully determined to take immediate action.
“Our funding will not only support councils delivering vital services that meet the needs of their communities but also pave the way for our long-term plan to get us back on track to end homelessness once and for all.”
According to the government, around 123,100 households, including almost 160,000 children, currently live in temporary accommodation.
The government has established an inter-ministerial group, chaired by housing secretary Angel Rayner, to bring together ministers across government to develop a long-term homelessness strategy with mayors and councils across the UK.
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