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As a result of the increased demand on homelessness services Glasgow City Health and Social Care Partnership needs to rapidly increase its use of temporary accommodation.
A Glasgow council officer has said that the homeless population in the city is “different” to other parts of the UK and world.
Questions over how to reduce the reliance on emergency accommodation to help people experiencing homelessness have been raised by a councillor. During Wednesday’s operational performance and delivery scrutiny committee Bailie Soryia Siddique asked if the council was looking at cheaper options or homeless villages to try and tackle the problem.
It comes as the local authority continues to support the Glasgow Alliance to end homelessness and their work to improve homelessness services in the city by promoting the Housing First model to reduce use of temporary accommodation.
As a result of the increased demand on homelessness services Glasgow City Health and Social Care Partnership needs to rapidly increase its use of temporary accommodation.
Bailie Siddique said: “I have a question around homelessness and obviously with the number of pressure points in Glasgow with regards to homelessness and there’s a reliance on bed and breakfasts.
“I know there is a lot of work being done on that and there are working groups as well are there other models that we are looking at – UK wide, abroad where we are looking at cheaper options, better options with a less financial burden.
“In terms of replacing the reliance on bed and breakfast, I hear quite a few things, see things online, like homelessness villages but is there anything we are looking at in terms of best practice from other local authorities?
“There’s not enough social homes and we are aware that we need more social homes but apart from that in terms of the overreliance on bed and breakfast what are we looking at?”
A council officer confirmed that Glasgow was the local authority impacted by homelessness with more than 6000 people registered as homeless.
They said: “We are working alongside Edinburgh because obviously they are also impacted and there is significant work taking place nationally around other options.
“We absolutely do not want people in emergency accommodation. The strategy you know focuses on how we can settle people as quickly as possibly can.
“The introduction of a homeless village, and there are examples of that, requires significant investment in a temporary measure.
“So the strategy focuses on how we can increase the availability of accommodation in the city with our RSLs (Registered Social Landlords) and invest in that housing market.
“There has been significant work done around that. Our homelessness population is probably significantly different from other areas across the world and even the UK it’s very different.
“We have a very different population and demographic, poverty and drug use, alcohol use and mental health. It is very difficult to look at other models but our strategy looks at how we can increase the availability of people who find themselves homeless.
“There are over 6000 at the moment in terms of homelessness not in emergency accommodation that we have a full duty to respond to.”
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