Issue - items at meetings - Evidence from Witnesses

Witnesses confirmed for this meeting are:

• Stuart Kichenside, Area Service Manager (Brighton & Hove, East Sussex, West Sussex), Sanctuary Supported Living

• Brian Doughty, Head of Adults Assessment, BHCC Adult Social Care

• Peter Castleton, Community Safety Manager, BHCC

• Rob Liddiard, Friends First

Confirmed witnesses for this meeting are:

• Bev Davison (CRI)

• Off The Fence

8.1       The witnesses at this meeting were:

• Bec Davison (BD), Deputy Director South, CRI
• Ellie Reed (ER), Complex Needs Social Worker, CRI

CRI is a national organisation providing services around drugs, alcohol, antisocial behaviour, domestic violence and rough sleeping. CRI has been contracted to work with rough sleepers in Brighton & Hove for the past 12 years, and also provides non-clinical substance misuse services across the city.

• John Child (JC), Deputy Service Director, Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust (SPFT)

SPFT provides statutory mental health and substance misuse services to people across Sussex.

• Sara Emerson (SE), Off The Fence

Off The Fence is a small, local community organisation providing help and support to homeless people. Off The Fence also helps to house some people, including people with no local connection (in partnership with Emmaus).

• David Richards (DR), service user

Mr Richards is a local homeless person.

• John Routledge (JR), Project Co-ordinator, SHORE (Sussex Homeless Outreach Reconnection and Engagement)

SHORE seeks to bring together local authorities across Sussex to co-ordinate their approaches to dealing with single homeless people.

• Sarah Gorton (SG), Homeless Link

Homeless Link is a national representative body for organisations involved in homelessness

• Narinder Sundar (NS), Commissioning Manager, BHCC Housing

• Richard Scott (RS), a local resident

8.2Increasing numbers of rough sleepers. BD told members that CRI operates ‘very assertive outreach’ engaging with and supporting rough sleepers, but discouraging rough sleeping as an option. Historically CRI has been successful in maintaining a relatively low number of rough sleepers in the city, despite there being a very high throughput – i.e. there are lots of people rough sleeping, but most are quickly diverted into other services.  However, the past two years have seen a significant increase in numbers; in large part this is clearly due to the economic situation, with many new rough sleepers part of an emerging demographic of low needs/work-ready homeless people who don’t have the money for a deposit, and lack the social capital to avoid rough sleeping. In general, services targeted at this cohort are very effective – this group of people needs help with deposits etc. rather than traditional homeless support.

8.3Social capital. BD noted that there seemed to be a general problem around social capital: where it had previously typically taken the average homeless person seven years to exhaust their social capital and become a rough sleeper, this was currently taking more like a year. This is a national trend, but has impacted disproportionately in Brighton & Hove, due to high housing costs and other problems associated with gaining tenancies. Attention needs to be given to why social capital has diminished to such a  degree, and what can be done to reverse the decline – e.g. identify good practice in local communities and promulgate it.

8.4Local connection. BD noted that there have always been a proportion of homeless people with no local connection to Brighton & Hove, but that in recent times it has proven much harder than before to re-connect these clients with their localities, often because other local authorities are reluctant to accept their duties to house. This can create a back-log, as Brighton & Hove will not relocate homeless people until there is appropriate support in place for them.

8.5High needs clients. BD told members that there was a small group of homeless people with very complex needs who had a disproportionate impact on the local area. This group requires very intensive professionally-led case coordination from expert social workers and other professionals. Case coordination is key because this client group typically needs support from many different services. As these users may be distrustful of statutory services, there may be a key role for the community sector in providing some of this co-ordination. The group also needs to be able to access secure, stable accommodation if the support services are to have a chance of working effectively, which is not always the case.

8.6Hostels and clients with complex needs. NS added that many people in this client group struggled in a hostel environment: e.g. living closely with others and having to adhere to rules of behaviour - but there is often little alternative accommodation. ED gave an example of a client with 30+ hostel evictions; it was clear that this client could not live successfully in a hostel environment, but might, with appropriate levels of support, be able to manage to live in a flat, where he would be away from other drugs users and wouldn’t have to comply with hostel rules etc. This client was currently being housed in a ‘training flat’ (used to facilitate people’s transition from band 2 supported accommodation to more independent living), and this was working well, but arranging this had proved needlessly challenging. The pathway for progressing through the hostel system and accessing band 3 (unsupported) accommodation requires clients to have lived successfully in band 2 (hostel) accommodation – but whilst this might make sense for most clients, it clearly does not for those who are unable to cope with hostels but might be able to live successfully (with appropriate support) in other accommodation.

8.7Alternatives to hostels. SG told members that some local authorities had actively explored this issue (e.g. Westminster and Oxford), placing complex clients directly into flats. These initiatives have had good results, although they are costly. BD noted that, although the costs here might be high, they were almost certainly much lower than the full costs associated with unsuccessfully housing clients with complex needs in hostels (i.e. including the costs of A&E attendances, contact with police and the criminal justice system etc). One problem here is that costs are not currently calculated in this way; if the true costs of failing to house this client group were calculated, then specialist interventions might appear to be a relative bargain. This is an area where city partnerships do not go nearly as far as they need to deliver effective results.

8.8Stock availability. NS told the panel that, for such an initiative to be undertaken there needs to be appropriate housing stock available, and this may not always be the case, or it may be that there are competing demands for a limited supply of stock. SG noted that the housing stock for this need not necessarily be specialist stock: general needs housing could be used provided that the appropriate support services are in place.

8.9Needs of other hostel clients. SE pointed out that housing people with very complex needs (who can be aggressive etc.) in hostels can deter other potential users; finding alternative accommodation may help both the group of people with complex needs and the much broader group of potential hostel users.

8.10    Targeted approach. BD suggested that it might be possible to target and prioritise the most complex homeless clients, designing services around them – in a similar way to the ‘troubled families’ work around families.  Such work would need to be outcomes-focused (which current support generally isn’t). There wouldn’t necessarily be a need for additional funding to support this approach, but it would require partners to acknowledge their likely expenditure and contribute accordingly. However, this would be a very complex piece of work given the co-morbidities that may such people experience. BD suggested that it might be worthwhile to map the financial case for this type of targeted intervention in order to compare it to current models.

8.11    Silo working. SG pointed out that there were currently often issues with agencies working in ‘silos’. Organisations were sometimes reluctant to take on clients, particularly if they felt that there was a considerable financial risk involved (e.g. they might end up providing expensive long term support). JR noted that the police were sometimes obliged to arrest individuals in order to persuade statutory services to undertake mental health or learning disability assessments. JC noted that there could be an issue with clients who were eligible for some statutory services, but who failed to meet the criteria for others – such clients could miss out on receiving properly holistic care.

8.12    ‘Personal budgets’.  JR argued that the solution to silo working was to encourage partners to recognise the high costs entailed in failing to support homeless people with complex needs, and the potential value for money gains to be made from co-ordinated investment in individuals. One model would be via a ‘personal budget’ for complex homeless clients, with an independent ‘broker’ coordinating their care.

8.13    Pan-Sussex working. JR noted that there was a risk in providing high quality homeless services in any one locality, as this might attract people from other, less generous areas. This risk can be mitigated by co-ordinating approaches across neighbouring areas – a project to do this across Sussex is currently being developed. BD noted that, in any case, Brighton & Hove would likely remain as an attractive destination for rough sleepers: it has a mild climate, is a relatively safe place, there are good non-statutory services and easily available drugs etc.

8.14    Pathways. BD argued that the current pathways to access homelessness services could be too restrictive – negotiating a way around them for clients who don’t readily fit into the pathway can be very time-consuming, and a more flexible approach would make more sense. JC agreed that pathway redesign was a priority. NS agreed that this was important, but pointed out that pathway re-design was much easier to achieve between organisations that had shared budgets or which had formally agreed to work together to deliver services. Lacking this degree of integration and joint input, pathway design can be tricky, as providers may be understandably wary of re-designs that might potentially lead to the de-commissioning of their services.

8.15    Hostels. ES told members that large hostels were no longer an appropriate of housing at risk homeless people: they were too big and rule-bound for the most complex clients; and the presence of people with substance problems or evincing anti-social behaviour discouraged low needs homeless people from using them. SG agreed that the demographics of homelessness had shifted radically in recent years, with big increases in both relatively low and in very high needs clients presenting for help. BD added that using much smaller units of housing might make more sense. Thought should also be given to whether these services actually needed to be based in the city.

8.16    Policing. BD told members that the police had made great strides in recent years to understand and develop links with homeless people (e.g. the Street Community Policing Team). However, whilst this work was really valuable, there was a risk that there was too little enforcement directed at the homeless, with some very anti-social behaviour being ignored due to concerns about the vulnerabilities of homeless people. This lack of enforcement could have the perverse effect of encouraging anti-social behaviour. JC noted that there were parallel issues for SPFT in terms of the police’s reluctance to use enforcement measures in dealing with some mental health service users.

8.17    Community Re-Integration. BD stressed the importance of trying to re-integrate rough sleepers into the community rather than simply providing them with shelter, and pointed to the successful use of ex-rough sleeper mentors in this role. In general, services which aim to provide professional support to small networks of service users, rather than the traditional model of providing services from on-high, may be the best way forward.

8.18    People leaving custody. SE told the panel that people just released from Lewes Prison could regularly be found rough sleeping in Brighton & Hove. This group, particularly if they have no local connection, can pose particular problems for services, and require specialist engagement – which may not be readily available. NS added that the Housing Options team does do in-reach work with Lewes Prison (funded by the probation service), offering advice to prisoners due be released. However, this service is targeted at those with a  local connection. There is also a hostel for ex-offenders, but this has limited places.

8.19    Complexity of services. JC commented that the complexity of the map of services for people requiring housing and housing support was a problem; often even professionals don’t fully understand all the services available.

8.20    Scope of services (a). SG told members that there was no obligation for local authorities to refuse to house people who are ‘intentionally homeless’, and that some councils (e.g. Hastings) have decided not to apply the intentionality criteria – arguing that few people actually deliberately choose to make themselves homeless, and that in any case people remain homeless and in need of support whether they are ‘intentionally’ homeless or not. However, there is uncertain value in relaxing eligibility criteria if, as is the case in Brighton & Hove, there is no accommodation available.

8.21    Scope of services (b). BD remarked that lots of resources went into assessing and then rejecting applicants for homeless status, and that some of this money might be better spent actually housing people.

8.22    Scope of services (c). DR told members that he had applied as homeless and been deemed not eligible due to insufficient local connection, despite having lived in the city for 5 years in the relatively recent past. DR argued that local connection should not be applied via blanket rules, but needed to be interpreted on a case by case basis to ensure fairness.

8.23    Making a homeless application. DR told the panel that his experience of making a homeless application had been very poor – it had taken more than four months to receive a judgement, with the Housing service claiming that the application had been lost in the system ( a claim that other applicants reported being made on numerous occasions – meaning either that the system for processing applications was inadequate, or that claims of losing applications were just a delaying tactic). DR read out a statement on others’ experience of homelessness services (this statement will be included as a written submission in the final scrutiny panel report).

8.24    Recording homelessness data. DR argued that the real levels of homelessness in the city are hidden because the city council does not classify people whom it considers ineligible for homelessness services (e.g. under the grounds of intentionality or local connection) as nonetheless homeless. For example, this group is categorised on the housing register as “unsatisfactorily housed” rather than homeless. The scrutiny panel requested that BHCC Housing provide a response to this point.

8.25    Helpfulness. DR made the point that help and advice for homeless people should actually be helpful, whether or not the local authority believes it has a duty to house. However, his experience, and that of other applicants, was that this was not necessarily the case at all – applicants were not even always told whether their homeless applications had actually been submitted. SG agreed that local homelessness services ought be supportive, recognising that no one made a frivolous homelessness application, even if they might not meet the statutory eligibility criteria for assistance.

8.26    Dual diagnosis. JC told the panel that Dual Diagnosis services (i.e. support for people with mental health and substance misuse co-morbidities) were still a major issue, particularly in terms of finding suitable supported housing for this very vulnerable and challenging client group. Things had improved in the past few years, but there was still a good deal to be done. The panel Chair suggested that the panel should refer back to the BHCC scrutiny panel on Dual Diagnosis recommendations to inform its thinking on this matter.

8.27    Culture of dependency. BD noted that it was important not to encourage a ‘culture of dependency’, where people had unrealistic expectations of being supported by statutory services. People needed to have a realistic understanding of the services available to them, particularly in somewhere like Brighton & Hove where there is so much demand for a limited supply of housing.

8.28    Working with landlords (a). Witnesses discussed how best to work with private landlords to support them in managing problematic tenancies and thereby reduce the number of people made homeless in the first place. NS told members that a great deal was already being done via the city Strategic Housing Partnership (SHP) which brought together the council, the city universities, landlords, developers and letting agents etc. However, demand for rental accommodation is growing in the city, particularly from professionals, and it is not an easy task to persuade landlords to engage with rather than simply evict problem tenants. NS added that the Housing Options team did offer support to private landlords and could try and negotiate/mediate in disputes about anti-social behaviour, rent arrears etc.

8.29    Working with landlords (b). RS suggested that the council might consider intervening in private landlord/tenant disputes – e.g. offering to guarantee the payment of a tenant’s debts if they were allowed to retain their tenancy and then working with the tenant to recover those debts gradually.

8.30    Homeless voices. DR pointed out that the views of homeless people are important, but seldom heard. He suggested that hostels be encouraged to use the ‘talking circle’ approach to engage with clients. BD agreed that homeless voice was very important and stressed the positive role that ex-homeless mentors could play here.

Witnesses for this meeting are:

• Sylvia Peckham, Head of Temporary Accommodation and Allocations, BHCC

• Emily Ashmore, Allocations Manager, BHCC

• Jenny Knight, Commissioning Officer for Rough Sleepers, Single Homeless and Substance Abuse, BHCC

3.1       Witnessses. The panel heard evidence from Sylvia Peckham (SP), Brighton & Hove City Council (BHCC) Head of Temporary Accommodation and Allocations; Narinder Sundar (NS), BHCC Supporting People Manager; Emily Ashmore (EA), BHCC Allocations Manager; and Jenny Knight (JK), BHCC Commissioning Officer for Rough Sleepers.

3.2Homelessness Duties. SP explained that the local authority have statutory duties to provide accommodation for homeless people, provided that five criteria are met:

• that the person is eligible for services (e.g. they are a British citizen);
• that they are actually homeless (or will imminently be made homeless);
• that they are not ‘intentionally homeless’ (e.g. they are not being evicted due to their anti-social behaviour or failure to pay rent etc);
• that they have a ‘local connection’ (e.g. that they have lived in the area for 3 of the past 5 years, are working in the city, or have close family living in the city etc);
• That they are in a ‘priority need category’ (e.g. they have a vulnerability that means that they are in greater need of secure housing than most people).

3.3       Other Duties to House. Even where people fail to qualify for help under homeless legislation, they may be still eligible under adult social care (ASC) or children’s (CYP) legislation, where the eligibility rules are somewhat different. In past years, accommodation for these clients was generally arranged by the services concerned, but this was not always good value; nor were clients always properly supported in claiming Housing Benefit (HB) etc. (In two-tier local authorities, this split in responsibilities is clear as homelessness duties rest with District Councils whilst ASC/CYP duties lie with County Councils; but BHCC is a unitary authority, responsible for all these duties, and so we are one of relatively few authorities to provide temporary accommodation on a corporate basis.

3.4       Temporary Accommodation. It was formerly the case that the Council just reacted to homelessness and typically sought to discharge its responsibilities under homeless legislation by offering eligible clients secure tenancies. However, recent years have seen a move (here and elsewhere) away from this model, towards one which emphasises prevention, and which typically offers temporary accommodation to homeless clients. The previous model had been flawed in that it had the potential to encourage people to become homeless in order to access social housing tenancies. It also had the effect of placing relatively large numbers of vulnerable people in social housing (since you need, by definition, to be vulnerable to be accepted as homeless by the Council), with a potentially detrimental impact on the cohesiveness of these communities. Placing vulnerable people in temporary accommodation gives the housing service an opportunity to work with them to provide training and support to help them eventually manage their own tenancies, hopefully avoiding a situation where people who have failed to manage a tenancy and have become homeless are granted another tenancy which they will then fail to manage.

3.5       HB rules. Temporary accommodation can be used to provide short term or quite long term support, with a lease running for as much as 10 years in certain circumstances. In general, higher levels of HB are payable for temporary accommodation, reflecting the additional support and management costs involved. Efforts are made to ensure that the right size temporary accommodation is offered to homeless households. However in the case of emergency accommodation this is not always possible.

3.6       Powers to House. Whilst local authorities have specific duties under homeless, ASC or CYP legislation to house only certain groups of people, they are not restricted from offering support to other vulnerable people: councils may have the power to house even when there is no legal responsibility to do so, and may choose to support some particularly vulnerable people (typically rough sleepers) who do not meet the eligibility criteria. This is generally done under the auspices of the Wellbeing Act.

3.7       Severe weather service. JK told the panel that a severe weather service was available for rough sleepers. This was activated when the weather forecast was for two consecutive days of sub zero weather and was contracted to Brighton Housing Trust (BHT). The service was intended to be only temporary – there are severe difficulties entailed in providing open-access emergency accommodation of this type for more than a few days, as some of the client group are very challenging. NS noted that services provided by other parties (e.g. local churches) were additional to this.

3.8       Demand for severe weather service. The severe weather service provides 45 places across two shelters, plus, because of demand this winter, an additional five places in B&B accommodation. The local authority has no powers to compel rough sleepers to use this service, although mental health services may seek to use legislative powers to detain those rough sleepers who lack ‘capacity’ to make sound decisions about their own welfare; and the police may also intervene under vagrancy legislation, although such interventions are rare.

3.9       No Second Night Out. EA told members that “No Second Night Out” is a national initiative aimed at providing rapid support for new rough sleepers, ensuring that they do not become habituated to rough sleeping. The service is funded by the Homeless Transitions Fund, and run locally by BHT and CRI. New rough sleepers are generally housed in private B&B accommodation or hostels, although BHCC commissioned accommodation may sometimes be used. However, they are not housed in the hostels that cater for the most chaotic clients. The local authority has no specific duty to house rough sleepers, although it does need to ensure that it addresses Government targets. Most new rough sleepers have  previously not been in contact with council support services before being picked-up; but it is not clear that greater intervention with at-risk client groups would necessarily be helpful: most people at risk of homelessness manage to resolve their housing situation without recourse to statutory services, and there is a risk that early intervention would complicate rather than simplify matters.

3.10    Anti Social Behaviour. SP told the panel that there were particular problems with some hostel users consistently engaging in street drinking/anti-social behaviour and finding themselves stuck in a ‘revolving door’ of being barred from hostels/de-toxing/being given hostel places/being barred again etc. This issue might be best addressed by looking at whether city hostel provision was appropriately banded and supported. The issue is not necessarily about needing more places for high-needs clients, it may be about being able to spread risk more widely – there are particular problems associated with housing very high-needs clients together, as this can exacerbate anti-social behaviour.

3.11    Location of hostels. One particular issue here is the location of hostels. For historical reasons, much of the city’s hostel capacity is along the sea-front or near to London Rd/St James’ St. However, these areas are also hot spots for anti-social behaviour, street drinking, drug dealing etc, and there is an obvious risk in housing vulnerable homeless people with alcohol/substance misuse issues in such locations. A recent pilot scheme, placing clients in a slightly less central location, has been successful in reducing ASB, even though the hostel is still relatively central. This work is still at a relatively early stage, but the use of more peripheral locations for hostel services is being actively considered.

3.12    Support for challenging ASC clients. In general, the move for housing to offer a corporate housing service (i.e. to ASC and CYP clients as well as to people eligible for support under homelessness legislation) has been positive, with a seamless service saving the council significant sums of money. However, there have been some problems with these arrangements. In some instances, ASC clients have not received appropriate support (e.g. from Learning Disability services) to enable them to maintain their tenancies, which has resulted in severe damage to properties and the placing of people at risk. EA told members that matters had improved recently, but that there was still scope for a better relationship with Learning Disability services at an operational level.

3.13    Enforcement. When an ASC client is housed with appropriate levels of housing-related ASC support, it is also important that this support is not unilaterally withdrawn, as it can be almost impossible for housing services to deal with tenant misbehaviour in these circumstances: courts will very rarely permit tenancy enforcement action to be taken against a client with learning disabilities, for example.

3.14    Inappropriate hostel placements. JK told members that there is also a longstanding problem of some clients with really complex support needs being inappropriately placed in hostel accommodation because there is nowhere else for them. This group might include older people with alcohol problems whose drinking means that they cannot be placed in Sheltered housing; people with a ‘dual diagnosis’ of learning disabilities and substance misuse issues etc. There is no easy housing solution for these clients (whose vulnerabilities typically mean that they cannot be placed with other very vulnerable people), other than to try and ensure that supported accommodation in the city is as high quality and varied as possible.

3.15    Welfare Reforms. SP told the panel that major service concerns/pressures included the current welfare reforms, both in terms of reduced support for HB etc. and in potential changes to the way that HB is paid – with direct payments to tenants rather than landlords. This may potentially be a major problem for temporary accommodation, as the client group includes many people who will struggle to manage their own finances. It is not currently clear whether temporary accommodation will be excluded from this change (as supported housing has been). Pilots where temporary accommodation has not been excluded have seen a precipitous drop in rent collection rates for this type of property – to around 60%, as against the 98% collection rate currently achieved in the city (a drop to 60% rent collected locally in temporary accommodation would cost approximately £4 million pa). The Department of Work & Pensions (DWP) is currently lobbying for temporary accommodation to be exempt from direct payments, but the decision lies with the Department for Communities and Local Government (CLG), who have to date been reluctant to compromise on their grand vision for benefits reform.

3.16    HB changes. It had been anticipated that changes to HB already introduced (e.g. reductions in the amount that can be claimed by under 35s) would have had an impact on services, but this has not really been felt to date. It is unclear whether this is because the change has not proved detrimental, or because there has been a lag (e.g. as people use up their savings etc), but there will still be an impact at a later point.

3.17    Partnership with NHS services. In response to a question about partnership with city NHS services, EA told the panel that this was generally very good: an officer from Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust (SPFT) sits permanently with the housing allocations team to ensure that mental health support needs are addressed, and there has been effective co-working on issues such as Dual Diagnosis, and on the recently completed mental health accommodation review. NS confirmed that Housing works closely with health commissioners and/or providers on a number of programme and partnership boards. In fact, co-working with NHS partners is rather more developed than co-working with some internal partners.

3.18    Benchmarking. SP told the panel that BHCC was much larger than, and not readily comparable to, its immediate geographical neighbours, and consequently focused on comparing local services to obvious comparators such as Southampton and to the London boroughs, many of which have similar homelessness profiles.

3.19    The local market for housing. The Housing team works hard to encourage of plurality of accommodation providers across the city. We currently work with around 450 landlords, although much of our accommodation is sourced via several large entities. Brighton & Hove can be a challenging environment in which to source some types of housing, particularly B&B accommodation, where landlords can always opt to cater for the tourist market. Landlords active in this market are generally not eager to extend their services to include homeless people. The temporary/emergency accommodation market is also affected by trends in the general rental market. Currently, high house prices and the difficulties the mortgage market poses for first-time buyers, mean that landlords can achieve good prices in the wider market for their rental properties, making housing homeless people less attractive.

3.20    B&B Framework Contract. The council has recently developed a framework contract for B&B, for emergency accommodation, and for blocks of leased accommodation. This framework, in partnership with Lewes District Council, is intended to attract a wider range of providers to the market. SP offered to involve the scrutiny panel in the development of the detailed specifications of this contract.

3.21    Outcomes-Based Commissioning. In response to questioning about commissioning strategies, JK told the panel that Housing was moving to an outcomes-based commissioning model. This was an ongoing piece of work which would not be completed until 2014/15. NS added that there were clear benefits in working to outcomes rather than process targets, but that agreeing appropriate outcomes with providers was a complex process, as was designing a data collection/monitoring system that was robust but not over-onerous. Housing will seek to involve its CYP and ASC clients in this process as it progresses.

3.22    Service Users. JK told members that hostels are expected to engage service users around their expectations and experiences of the service, and generally do so. Getting feedback from users of unsupported emergency accommodation has proved much more challenging, although it is not clear why this should be so – there may however be issues with some clients’ literacy or understanding of English.

3.23    Housing Support Service (HSS). HSS provides floating support to people in emergency/temporary accommodation – e.g. to clients with alcohol problems. The support is partly signposting and partly helping with day to day tasks, particularly at the start of a tenancy. Additional funding for HSS has recently been found, with a significant increase in the number of clients being supported. The effectiveness of this support is currently being assessed.

3.24    Value for Money. Maintaining people with very complex needs in accommodation can be costly, and Housing will typically charge its ASC and CYP clients a management fee for their more challenging placements. However, the fees charged do not accurately reflect costs: Housing in effect offers subsidised places to ASC and charges CYP fees for only the first year of placements. This represents a considerable corporate saving.

3.25    Local Connection. Up to two thirds of rough sleepers in the city have no local connection; relatively few are even from Sussex. Brighton & Hove does not typically offer statutory services such as hostel places to people without a local connection (although the cold weather service is open to all), but is nonetheless seen as more welcoming to those without a local connection than many of its neighbours. The city may also have higher levels of non-statutory help which attracts rough sleepers from outside the area – e.g. the charitable provision of meals, sleeping bags etc. If, in the long term, this means that the city will see increasing numbers of rough sleepers, then the relative attractiveness of the city as a rough sleeper ‘destination’ is clearly a problem that will need addressing. However, this traffic is not just one way: there is a predictable drop in the number of locally-based rough sleepers in the winter months as people move to London, where there are more cold weather facilities.

3.26    Repatriating those with no local connection. People who are genuinely homeless, but with no local connection, will typically be encouraged to move back to somewhere where they do have a connection. BHCC will liaise with the relevant local authority to ensure that the homeless person will be able to access appropriate support in their home town. In some instances, people may have no local connection (e.g. for people who have been in the forces or in custody), or it may not be safe for them to be housed in their home towns (people fleeing domestic violence etc), and in these circumstances BHCC will have a duty to house them.

3.27    Waiting Lists. There are always more people without accommodation than there are places. Sometimes this may be because people have been barred from all hostels in the city, so there would be literally no one who would take them even if places were available. In such cases emergency accommodation may ‘bed-swap’ with the rough sleepers’ team. In other instances, people may have very complex physical or mental health needs which makes it very difficult to house them; or people may simply choose to rough sleep. However, even excluding these groups there is generally a waiting list of 20-40 days to accommodate a locally connected rough sleeper.