Written evidence submitted by Homeless Link [HOL 159]

Tackling Re-offending and Homelessness

Current Context, barriers and effective practice

Key Facts and Figures

There are already significant challenges facing those with a history of homelessness to find and maintain a place to call home. The link between housing and recidivism are well evidenced.

• 22% people in accommodation for single homeless people across England are prison leavers[1]

• 60% of prisoners reported that having a place to live would help them stop reoffending[2].

• 16% of surveyed prisoners were homeless or living in temporary accommodation shortly after release. They had a higher chance of re-offending with 66% going on to re-offend, compared with 51% of those who were not.

• 15% of offenders were homeless prior to custody. 79% of offenders who had been homeless prior to custody were reconvicted within a year compared with 47% of those who had accommodation.

• 35% of young people aged 16–25 felt a lack of accommodation was the factor most likely to make them offend. 46% of homeless people surveyed across six UK cities had been in prison or a young offender institution, first occurring on average aged 21.

• 12% of prisoners depend on housing benefit to help with their rent before they enter custody. However, entitlement to housing benefit stops for all sentenced prisoners expected to be in prison for more than 13 weeks. This means that many prisoners have very little chance of keeping their tenancy open until the end of their sentence and lose their housing.

• Local authorities have a statutory duty to assist homeless and vulnerable ex-offenders in some circumstances. However, changes introduced by the Localism Act 2011 mean that authorities have more discretion to exclude certain applicants from their housing registers. This could make it more difficult for people with a history of anti-social behaviour to access social housing.

• There is also a growing body of evidence about the overlap between people who come into contact with the homelessness, criminal justice and substance use sector. Figure 1 shows where people use services across these three domains. Generally those who experience all three have poorer outcomes from services [Hard Edges, Lankelly Chase and Heriot Watt, 2015].

Barriers to finding accommodation

There are a number of barriers to adequate accommodation for homeless people in general. These can be compounded for people with an offending background:

1)      Rents have risen and are likely to continue to rise. These structural factors include: the chronic shortage of affordable rented accommodation, the fall in home ownership, the decline in social housing alternatives, the rise in the number of households in the private rented sector and the move to charging social rents at a rate of 80% of market rents.

2)      Rising rents have contributed to a shortage of low cost accommodation in many areas, limiting the housing options available to those leaving custody. We know that this already affects those in homelessness services where currently, a quarter of single people living in homelessness accommodation services are ready to move on to more independent accommodation but are unable to. In London, where we believe the rental/ Local Housing Allowance dichotomy is most severe, this increases to 36%[3].

3)      Despite the changes made to Local Housing Allowance rates since 2010 leading to a reduction in average awards there is no evidence that rents are falling. This means that fewer properties are available to clients on Housing Benefit. This is leading to problems in addressing people’s homelessness.

4)      The Shared Accommodation Rate (SAR) does not reflect the cost of renting. Property is becoming harder to find for under thirty-five year olds. Research has shown as little as 5% properties available to those affected by the SAR are affordable in London[4]. This is also reflected by the fact that in 2015-16 a third of Shared Accommodation Rate recipients are covered by the Targeted Affordability Fund (64 of 193 rates). This compares, for example, to just 14 per cent of one-bed rates supplemented by the Targeted Affordability Fund (27 of 193 rates).

5)      There is reduced investment in support services which can help vulnerable housed and homeless individuals move away from homelessness. The National Audit Office (NAO) found spending on the Supporting People programme, housing support and advice for vulnerable people had fallen, on average, by 45% between 2010-11 and 2013-14. Since 2010, 133 homelessness projects have closed, and there are 4,000 fewer bed spaces. People who are in housing need with additional needs relating to their offending background will also have been impacted by these changes.

Against this backdrop, there are additional barriers facing those with offending backgrounds, which include:

• Councils and housing associations will often refuse to house someone if they have a history of anti-social behaviour or previous convictions[5]. This can directly discriminate against those coming out of prison
• Rent arrears, which can be built up while in custody, which can make accessing a new tenancy harder and is also likely to bring issues around debt. Even without arrears it can still be problematic to save for a deposit or rent in advance required for many PRS tenancies.
• Landlord reluctance to rent to those with an offending background. Historically some landlords have been reluctant to rent to those on housing benefit due to benefit delays, and because it is now harder to have HB paid directly to a landlord (there are some exceptions)[6]. This, in addition to an offending background, has created disincentive and other groups of tenants are likely to be prioritised. Homeless Link members share feedback that this can be a major barrier for their clients[7].
• Maintaining accommodation – for ex-prisoners there may be additional challenges with maintaining accommodation, due to confidence around managing a tenancy and having in place support networks to reintegrate positively into a community. Lack of ongoing support was a key barrier in accessing sustainable accommodation identified in research Homeless Link conducted with ex-offenders across England[8].
• Finding accommodation away from negative networks to avoid returning to crime: some prisoners do not want to be relocated to their home area which can reduce their options as they may not have a local connection to any other area[9]
• For many leaving prison, addiction, breakdown in relationships, poor physical or mental health and social isolation can perpetuate homelessness or make tenancies difficult to sustain. Some people will require support from a range of services to address these. A lack of continuity of support between custody and the community can exacerbate these difficulties.
• Lack of early planning for release: it is recognised that planning for accommodation should start as early as possible and while some research suggests provision of housing advice has improved, this does not always lead to accommodation being secured before someone leaves custody[10].

What can help address these barriers?

Existing projects and examples of effective practice:

• Shelter Cymru published a report in May 2015[11] looking at effective housing pathways for prison leavers – there is a lot of evidence about ‘what works’ which is transferable to other parts of the UK. Key findings for practice included:
• Pre-tenancy training for all prisoners
• Earlier housing plans pre-release
• Ensuring access to ID and bank accounts on leaving custody
• Better partnership working between agencies delivering through the Gates provision and wider community services
• Peer mentoring
• Housing First
• Greater role for Floating support to reduce risks of repeat homelessness and offending

• The £20m Homeless Transition Fund administered by Homeless Link gave grants to agencies across England to reduce rough sleeping and tackle homelessness – some of these worked with those leaving prison [further detail available on request].
• No Second Night Out Salford, Riverside: The project incorporates support workers and a through the gate service, Gate Buddies, for offenders into NSNO in Salford. The support workers assist new rough sleepers off the streets immediately into accommodation. Gate Buddies will be a peer lead volunteer service. The Buddies will be ex-offenders who lead a more settled lifestyle. The Buddies will meet the offender in prison and offer mentoring through the gate into the community. They will work closely with the NSNO support workers to ensure no-one should arrive on the street. 
• St Giles Trust: This 2 year project that provided an intensive resettlement support service to former rough sleepers leaving prisons in South London with the aim of reducing homelessness and reoffending for a particularly entrenched client group. It will complement the applicant’s existing work in prisons.
• Trident Reach, Birmingham: this established sustainable coherent pathways into accommodation for homeless people leaving prison and at risk of rough sleeping.

• Homeless Link’s ‘Better Together’ project 2011 examined joint work with the CJ sector – existing evidence of effective joint working arrangements and clients’ experiences of being supported by staff in the criminal justice and homelessness sector. [12] Key principles from effective practice included:
• Earlier advice and intensive housing planning before release
• Adequate support on discharge to resettle, including practical support
• Support to access accommodation (access into the PRS, rent deposit schemes, particularly out of area)
• Joined up support with other services they may be in contact with (employment, substance use)

• There is useful learning from the MEAM approach areas (Making every Adult Matter). Through MEAM, we work with local areas across England who are seeking to provide better support to the 58,000 people in England who face overlapping problems of homelessness, substance misuse and contact with the Criminal Justice System in any one year. Based on independent research, we estimate total cost of public spending on this group to fall between £1.1bn and £2.2bn a year[13]. A body of evidence now exists that targeted interventions can realise significant savings against criminal justice and health expenditure, and more importantly transform the lives of these individuals.

Recommendations for improving outcomes for ex-offenders

1. Better transparency about how offenders’ accommodation needs being met under Transforming Rehabilitation?

• How are different CRCs are meeting their obligations to meet accommodation needs of their clients? Anecdotally we have heard the measures about the quality, type and length of time accommodation is ‘sustained’ are limited and these need to be strengthened to ensure responsibilities about finding prison leavers accommodation are met.

There is scope for CRCs to publish and report on:

• The frameworks/approaches being used to assess and measure housing outcomes
• Service/delivery models to provide housing and accommodation for those leaving prison (e.g resettlement support; routes into accommodation; tenancy support; evidence of good practice)

2. Tackling the systematic barriers to accommodation for ex-offenders

Many of the barriers facing homeless people are made more acute by an offending background (eg local connection; local allocation policies; access to PRS). The Ministerial Working Group has a role to play in trying to address these.

3. Clearer expectations need to be set for prisons so that housing and support is available for every person leaving prison:

• Despite excellent results from some resettlement teams, in-reach housing advice and services, prisoners are still released with nowhere to go.
• Prisons should develop a clearer set of guidelines for release date arrangements which outline how other support services are engaged in this process.
• Guidelines need to include processes for identifying and holding a supported housing bedspace.
• Specific timing of release is an important factor. Release arrangements need to ensure that if a prisoner is released without accommodation they are released at a time when they can access services in the community.
• More could be done to identify housing needs early on and put in place measures to prevent loss of home while in prison. This includes being aware of changes under UC in which housing costs will be paid for 6 months.
• Evaluating how different through the gates schemes target and address housing need. What are the measures which are being used to assess housing outcomes?

4. Mitigating cross-departmental policies which might negatively impact on offenders’ housing

1. DWP must recognise ex-offenders as a potentially vulnerable group who can face multiple barriers to the labour market. As such, ex-offenders require greater support in their journey to employment and this needs to be reflected in the requirements and conditions imposed on them, in the claimant commitment.

May 2016