Just one night on the street is someone experiencing trauma

It's our duty to ask

Every single one of Change Grow Live's adult services will come into contact with someone who is homeless or on the edge of homelessness.

Adopting a ‘duty to ask’ across our organisation — and the drug and alcohol sector as a whole — would significantly broaden our reach.

Often, someone might not identify as homeless. They might be staying on a friend's floor, sleeping in a car, staying with an abusive partner. Rather than asking, “are you homeless?”, enquiring whether someone has somewhere safe to stay tonight can allow them to open up about staying on a sofa, or feeling unsafe at home.

From our experience, we know that they're on that cliff edge. They could be on a sofa tonight; in the morning, they're on the street. They are the rough sleepers of tomorrow.

All our staff need to understand where to refer someone if they present as homeless or at risk of becoming so. By ensuring that staff feel confident to ask questions, we can encourage those conversations and offer pathways into support.

Lessons learned from the pandemic

During the pandemic, we got almost everyone off the streets, including many who had said no to everything previously. The reason is clear: we were not offering them a bed in a night shelter, in a room with other people. Instead, we gave them a key to a room with their own bathroom. For the first time, they felt safe.

There was a huge opportunity. We needed to make sure that more permanent housing pathways were in place. Unfortunately, that didn't always happen.

Some people did stay off the streets, but we also saw many go back out because what they were offered after the hotel was unsuitable. If they turned down accommodation in the area which they felt would negatively impact their recovery, they were not offered an alternative.

We cannot let that happen again.

Conclusion

I do believe the Prime Minister's pledge is achievable if we work collaboratively. Everybody must be involved. It's not just about homes; it is about treatment services working together with health, social care, housing. We need the whole picture.

At Change Grow Live, we're fortunate to have mental health workers, nurses, doctors, prescribers and outreach workers, so we're in a unique position and we can pull together.

It's going to be extraordinarily busy, but we're excited to be part of such a huge and important challenge. And we're ready for it.