Www.york.ac.uk/chp Nicholas Pleace Future Directions for Finnish Homelessness Policy : A British perspective

www.york.ac.uk/chp

Nicholas Pleace

Future Directions for Finnish Homelessness

Policy: A British perspective

www.york.ac.uk/chpwww.york.ac.uk/chp

Overview

• Exploring the Finnish homelessness strategy from a British perspective

• Housing First • Homelessness prevention• The social integration of homeless people• Strategic planning of homelessness

services • Future challenges

• Migrant homelessness • Affordable housing supply

www.york.ac.uk/chp

Successes of Housing First

• Housing First delivers housing sustainment, ends homelessness for 80%+

• Can also produce ontological security – the sense of having a secure, settled, predictable life linked to having a secure home - can improve health, well-being and social integration

• Giving long-term and recurrently homeless people secure, adequate housing and appropriate, flexible, non-judgemental, respectful, support within a client-led/ personalisation and harm reduction framework works

• May save money in lifetime costs, deliver better results than existing services

• Following this core philosophy seems more important than replicating the detail of any single model


Housing First: British Experience

• Little experience with North American models of Housing First/permanent supportive housing

• Extensive experience with housing-led services, using a low intensity case management model and ordinary social rented and private rented housing

• UK experience reflects global evidence base, i.e. flexible and open ended mobile support with a harm reduction framework using ordinary housing leads to good outcomes in housing sustainment

• Mixed service provision, still widespread use of supported housing models although much less use of emergency accommodation


Housing First: British Experience

2012/2013Service Type Single

homeless support needs

Percent Homeless families support needs

Percent Rough Sleeper

Percent

Supported housing 18,071 50% 2,306 24% 1,794 53%Supported lodgings 276 1% 1 0% 17 1%Women’s refuge 82 0% 108 1% 0 0%Foyer 1,174 3% 2 0% 15 0%Teenage parent 104 0% 97 1% 0 0%Direct access 6,718 19% 695 7% 470 14%Floating support 8,929 25% 5,855 62% 513 15%Outreach service 702 2% 309 3% 499 15%Resettlement services 243 1% 91 1% 50 1%All 36,299 100% 9,464 100% 3,358 100%

2013/2014Supported housing 17,488 50% 2,139 27% 1,375 43%Supported lodgings 269 1% 0 0% 15 0%Women’s refuge 48 0% 46 1% 0 0%Foyer 1,057 3% 5 0% 8 0%Teenage parent 78 0% 76 1% 1 0%Direct access 6,575 19% 275 4% 672 21%Floating support 8,952 25% 5,039 65% 609 19%Outreach service 572 2% 196 3% 501 15%Resettlement services 227 1% 34 0% 54 2%All 35,266 100% 7,810 100% 3,235 100%

Source: Supporting People Client Record (England)


Successes in Finland

• Use of a communal or congregate model of Housing First has been highly successful in reducing long-term homelessness

• Evidence that communal Housing First schemes visited by the research team offered stable, secure homes in which many residents were happy. Delivering sustained exits from homelessness

• Core elements associated with success are as found elsewhere: respect for individuals and their choices, separation of housing rights and support services, harm reduction

www.york.ac.uk/chp

Limits of Housing First

• Between 5-20% of long term homeless people do not engage successfully

• Not clear that gains in health, well-being and social integration are rapid - or uniform – process by which they are meant to be delivered is imprecisely defined

• Ongoing arguments about whether congregate/communal models of Housing First can deliver social and community integration and whether they are more difficult to manage

• Some doubts on costs • Quality of US evidence base

questioned, although arguments weakened as Housing First finds success more widely. Some evaluations equate high fidelity/replication with successful outcomes


Housing First: British Experience• Low intensity, housing led models are hugely

reliant on working relationships with health, social work, mental health, drug and alcohol services and the wider welfare system

• Low intensity case management only model cannot function without good joint working

• Requires all components of a multi-agency package of support to be adequately resourced and prepared to commit those resources

• Housing sustainment can be achieved, but same questions about social integration, health, well-being


Limits of Housing First in Finland

• Some issues with community integration

• Questions over delivery of social integration when formerly long-term homeless people are living in distinct, separate communal accommodation• Criticism assumes scattered models of Housing First

achieve more social integration (which is not clear) and that communal Housing First is inherently unable to promote social integration

• One type of service might not suit all, scope to explore with scattered housing models of Housing First and with housing-led services, although issues around housing supply have to be recognised

• Initial evidence of some management problems, but picture appears to be one of stability at present


Homelessness Prevention

• Development of the housing social work services providing housing advice, help centred on preventing eviction and with access to adequate and affordable housing closely reflects good practice in British homelessness prevention

• Equally, presence of specialist services to prevent homelessness among groups like young people and ex-offenders reflects existing British practice.

• Finnish preventative policy close to approaches elsewhere, but could be scope to take this further, increase extent and range of services



• There are additional models that could be tried in Finnish context • ‘Foyer’ or similar approaches

for young people that focus as much on social integration as housing need, providing training, education and help securing work alongside housing

• Sanctuary scheme approaches that stop women at risk of gender based/domestic violence from having to leave their home

Images copyright: East Thames HA



• Enhancing legal rights, e.g. to stop evictions and/or create a legal “right to housing”

• Theoretically attractive• But British experience is mixed, statutory

right to housing became strictly interpreted as resources were constricted

• Arguments that homelessness law changed characteristics of social housing negatively

• Strong evidence of inconsistency – “statutory” and “non-statutory” homelessness


Social Integration

• Existing Finnish services employ work and work related activities, arts-based work (creative and performance) centring on meaningful, engaging activity

• Clear evidence that structure and meaning in life enhances ontological security and promotes social integration, avoiding and moving past the ‘emptiness’ of sustained homelessness

• Could be scope to take this further, enhance existing and develop new services


Social Integration

• Expansion of services targeted on social integration for homeless people in Britain

• Services for homeless people offering arts-based activities, linked to education, training and job-seeking focused primarily on social integration, e.g. Crisis “Skylight” programme work of St Mungo’s Broadway in London, e.g. Time-Banking projects and social enterprises, e.g. Emmaus UK

• Arts-based activities can build emotional literacy and social skills, provide a route into more formal activity, education, job seeking. Some evidence it improves mental health


Social Integration

Image copyrights: Crisis, St Mungo’s Broadway, Streetwise Opera, Cardboard Citizens


Strategic Planning

• From a British perspective…

• Finland is an example to follow

• National strategic plan with clearly defined targets

• Letters of intent at municipal level formalise the commitments needed to deploy the national strategy

• By contrast, UK had a lot of municipal level strategies in 2000s plus different strategies for England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, devolution of power in Localism agenda has led to increased variation and inconsistency


Strategic Planning


Migrant Homelessness

• No easy answer in relation to migrant homelessness

• Question of striking a balance between humanitarian responses

• And need for border control• Like Britain, Finland cannot ‘import’

homelessness • But where a requirement for repatriation

exists, it should be handled in ways that cause the least distress


Housing Supply

• Most of the EU faces similar problems around supply of adequate, affordable, housing

• Difficulties with the cost of social housing and some of the negative outcomes (spatial concentration of poverty) that may be associated with large scale development

• Free market does not deliver sufficient housing at the right cost and right quality

• Scope for innovation


Housing Supply

• British examples of innovation include• Local lettings agencies, a self-financing

model that is designed to enhance access to the adequate housing in the private rented sector for homeless and vulnerable groups of people

• Mixed tenure and cross-subsidising developments by social landlords, building full market price housing which is sold, to help finance more affordable housing


Thanks for Listening

• [email protected]• www.york.ac.uk/chp• @CHPresearch • www.feantsaresearch.org/• www.womenshomelessness.o

rg/

Documents

Www.york.ac.uk/chp Nicholas Pleace Future Directions for Finnish Homelessness Policy : A British perspective