Tackling and Preventing Homelessness in the UK - Essay Example

Tackling and Preventing Homelessness in UK Introduction – Definition of Homelessness Homelessness in the United Kingdom, though well defined by statute, is variously interpreted in literature as (i) rooflessness (care of streets), (ii) short-term bed and breakfast accommodation, (iii) impending, short lived and under duress to quit informal accommodation with friends etc., (iv) hostel or shelters at night kind of accommodations, (v) folded up in institutions for a long time with no alternative accommodation for a long period of time, (vi) heavily crowded and unhygienic accommodations, (vii) sharing accommodation while undergoing strained or abusive interpersonal relationships. Of late homelessness is regarded or defined more in relation to location based than situation based terms. The precise origin of homelessness can be traced back to the days of social inquiries into poverty and inequality all becoming noticeable after there was an explosion of population in UK due to the industrial revolution giving rise to abounding factories. To be more precise during the nineteenth century when industrial capitalism was prevailing in Western Europe witnessing rapid growth of the European industrial City the population of towns in UK were burgeoning. In 1800 with a massive population of over 900,000 London was the largest city in the world. That of Birmingham city grew by an alarming 273% between 1801 and 1851 from 71,000 to 2, 65,000, while Manchester rocketed from 75, 000 in 1801 to 3, 38, 000 in 1851, a stunning growth of 351% and Glasgow during the same period grew by 317% from 84, 000 to 3, 50, 000. (Lawton 1972) had clearly estimated that it was the urban areas which had absorbed almost all of the 27 million additional British populations between 1801 and 1911. This brought about a major social structural realignment creating two classes of people namely the Capitalists who invested in labour make profits and the Labourers who worked for the capitalists in return for a wage. This led to an unequal division of power between the two classes which in turn had a direct bearing on the formation of the industrial city. Immediately there was a socio-spatial distinction based on class visible in the society. Mobility of people between urbanized areas and non-urbanized areas caused housing issues. Some of the areas were too overcrowded and very unhygienic for living. Most of the families in England rented accommodation on weekly terms from private landlords while in Scotland the working classes were more likely to live in tenements managed by somebody in the absence of the actual landlord and let on yearly terms. At that time neither the employers nor the town councilors took responsibility for housing for the immigrants. This was left to exploiting builders who had large lands and less material and less material and labour. Due to this rather hapless situation dwelling were typified by double rows under a single roof facing the street on one side and while its back was up against an alley which had narrow entry passages at fixed intervals. At the end of the street used to be the sanitary facilities for a total headcount of 150 people and upwards. The densely constructed houses with limited spaces and inadequate sanitation or ventilation were a nightmare to any visiting medical officer. Even in the year 1913 investigations into housing conditions in Birmingham revealed that about 2, 00, 000 people were being housed in 43, 366 dwellings of the above back-to-back type which were already condemned as highly detrimental to health as there was no ventilation and was highly overcrowded due to want of space. Even more grave was the fact that 43, 020 houses had no separate water supply, no sinks, no drains, and 58, 028 had no western closets, they being communal and thrown open to courts which meant that more than quarter of a million people lived in deplorable conditions. It is under these pressing circumstances were born the origins of the homelessness policy first initiated to some extent by speculative builders who provided a namesake accommodation to settlers and then slowly later on by the governments and councils who planned and built new towns as a role model for other societies to follow. While it is also significant to follow and analyze the changing political processes associated with the cause of homelessness in UK especially during changing regimes of the recent Conservative Government (1979-1997) followed by the New Labour Government beyond 1997, a major factor which was affecting homelessness is the decentralized form of Governments in UK. Comprising of the four principalities which include England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland each have there own autonomous Self-Government bodies after the devolution of powers, though traditionally all of them were centrally administered from London. Now with only Ireland’s autonomy under suspension due to political developments there, other principalities especially Scotland enjoy extreme autonomy in terms of regional governance and can play a significant role to address the issue of homelessness. The Welsh and Irish establishments have owned responsibilities for policies on homelessness and are making housing and support services increasingly accessible. As a consequence of increase in homelessness in the 80’s multiple studies were conducted to research the cause and nature of the issue in UK. Among others, according to Encyclopedia of Homelessness, Anderson, Kemp and Quilgars (1993), Drake, O’Brien and Biebuyck (1981), Niner (1989) and O’ Callaghan et al. (1996) have demonstrated that the single most common characteristic is poverty. Studies on a smaller scale other than the above large-scale studies have also been conducted and the results have corroborated the findings of larger studies. Of late another trend towards homelessness has been significantly noticed, that of the sub category of homelessness population which comprise of family and young adults homelessness, rooflessness and non-urban or rural homelessness. Here the scope of nature and cause of homelessness varies in terms of many other risk factors that will be examined next. The identified causes of homelessness though manifold predominantly constitute penury, lack of social security, the supply / demand equation of housing system attributed to demographic factors, unemployment, flux in formation of families and fragility. Although the key factors identified for homelessness are unemployment and penury, still other risk factors which tend to aggravate the existing key factors further are homeless arising from criminal activities or imprisonment, a recent stint in defence services, absence of support socially, arrears or debts from mortgages, disorderly behavior with neighbours, drug abuse and alcohol, problems associated with mental and physical health. For these category of homeless people the background or the basis for their predicaments are surprisingly unrelatedly multifarious, such as youngsters abdicating parental homes after heated arguments, a disrupted relationship, turning a widow, moving out of care, moving out of prison, leaving defence forces, an abrupt drop in mental and physical health or misuse of alcohol. Housing Policy to tackle Homelessness in UK Premise Before we look at the policies that were formulated in the UK for tackling the menace of homelessness the strong views expressed by the leader of the Conservative Government in the mid 80’s, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, is in order here. According to (Encyclopedia of Homelessness; David Levinson 2004, pp. 577), “I think we’ve been through a period where too many people have been given to understand that if they have a problem, it’s the government’s job to cope with it. ‘I have a problem, I’ll get a grant’, ‘I’ am homeless, the government must house me.’ They are casting their problem on society. There are individual men and women, and there are families. And no government can do anything, except through people, and people must look to themselves first. It’s our duty to look after ourselves and then, also to look after our neighbour. People have got the entitlements too much in mind, without the obligations. There’s no such thing as entitlement, unless someone has first met an obligation.” Genesis of Housing and Housing Policy in UK Different governments have adorned different attitudes towards housing as such. Some look at it as a consumer good instead of social entitlement, though shelter is a basic human need. The issue of homelessness during days of industrial capitalism was closely knit with urbanization and town planning as demonstrated by the creation of twenty eight new towns as per the 1946 act. The first fourteen of them spread over outer London ring plus East Kilbride outside Glasgow were intended to cater to the objectives advocated by Howard, Barlow and Abercrombie for diverting population from already over crowded urban areas. There is no doubt that the policy of constructing new towns was a tremendous success. They provided congenial living homes for about 1.4 million people as well as an array of public facilities. However the critics of the policy had their own standpoint that the whole concept of new towns constituted just 5% of the national house-building programme and in view of the persisting problems in cities may be considered as ‘too few too late’. Despite criticisms intensive studies were conducted in 1960 to expand the New Town programme on a war footing basis and build new towns throughout UK. The South East study identified sites for displaced Londoners amounting to 5, 00, 000 by building nearly 1, 50, 0000 houses resulting in proposals being floated for New Towns at Newbury (Berkshire), Stansted (Essex), Ashford (Kent) and Bletchley (Buckinghamshire) developed as Milton Key which alone cost a whopping 700 million pounds. Owing to this enormous cost of building new towns and a fear of declining inner cities the concept of furthering new towns was given up in 1976. This immediately impacted the sixth new town construction for Scotland at Stonehouse in Lanarkshire which was finally abandoned. The then conservative Government of Margaret Thatcher confirmed this change in policy of emphasis in favour of the inner cities, and set the stage for privatization of New Towns. Under the New Towns and Urban Development Corporations Act of 1985 the commission for New Towns was to be totally disbanded and the accrued commercial assets of the existing New Towns were to be sold off while allowing private developers to play a major role in the resurrection of New Towns. So the British New Towns was a policy which was certain to be ousted once the living conditions of the inner cities were thoroughly taken care of and whether this would be revived will only be dictated by passage of time. Though homelessness caused by overspill of population caused by inner-city redevelopment has ended, the rise of suburbanization together with increase in employment has created continuous pressure on the government for residential development. The recent government envisaged residential requirements projects to 4.4 million new houses in England and Wales by 2016. The problem which persists is how to accommodate this spiraling growth. At Lower Early, adjoining the town of Reading, west of London along the M4 growth corridor, indication of a shift in government policy was discernible in favour of development of private new towns. About 6, 000 dwelling were built between 1977 and 1990 by a consortium of private builders. The commercial success of this venture led to the creation of Consortium Developers Limited (CDL) in 1983, a group of nine main private builders with a common aim of building 5, 000 dwelling replete with employment and social amenities. By 1989 CDL had floated proposals to build 4 new towns in Essex (Tillingham Hall), Hampshire (Foxley Wood), Oxfordshire (Stone Bassett) and Cambridgeshire (Westmere). 1977 Housing (Homeless Persons) Act Before 1977 homelessness was regarded as a welfare problem. As per the 1948 National Assistance Act county authorities were responsible for providing accommodation to persons in dire or unforeseen need. The number of people beginning to seek help mounted though the act was articulated by a circular stating that consideration of extending help was to those who were affected by either flood or fire and not to all those who are badly housed. The authorities dismissed the majority of people who were desperately in need of a proper permanent home as irresponsible seekers and ignored their earnest requests for a home. The Government could not do anything to help them and shielded a deaf ear to all cries for help from the homeless right through the 60’s and 70’s. Finally in 1966 when the media brought to highlight the plight of homeless through the play “Cathy came home” the Government had to take notice of public outcry against the stubbornness of the government to help the homeless. Charity organizations like the Shelter, the Catholic Housing Aid society and the Child Poverty Action Group joined hands and forced the government towards reform which resulted in the promulgation of the homelessness act in 1977 after a lot of debate and disagreement. Even though people welcomed the act it still did not help all the sections of homeless people since it catered to only qualified cases of homelessness like family with children, pregnant women, mentally disabled or people who are sick and of old age etc. This still left a large number of homeless unaddressed and uncared for. The next twenty years only so more restrictive practice and exercising of the act and in 1996 the priority waiting list of homeless needy people was completely abolished although in the interim, in 1989, the success of homeless act legislation was reiterated and recommended to be continued for a long time to come. It even proclaimed that there was a balance between the homeless and those badly housed. Despite all these the then conservative government forged ahead with reforms and instituted the 1996 housing act which removed the entitlement of permanent accommodation to homeless. 1996 Housing Act Provisions for Homelessness The above act was the first revision to the original Act of 1977 which saw lot of restrictions being imposed on the ease of access to accommodation for the homeless and housing needs. Though the earlier 1977 act placed the onus of providing housing to the needy almost unilaterally on the local authorities, lot of restrictive changes were incorporated into the revised act of 1996 which investigated the actual situation of homelessness requests for housing and deemed most of them as unworthy or misfit for permanent accommodation. It even went to the extent of denying accommodation to homeless even if there was an inkling of an idea that they were staying in some temporary accommodation, whatsoever and more so if they are already sharing the accommodation with an ineligible person. There was huge opposition to the act which spelt a disaster for the homeless affected and was almost a travesty of the original intentions behind the initiation of the very act. However the opposition labour party made sure that the government dispensed with some of the unforgiving measures such as curbs on the duration of housing for homeless which was restricted to a maximum of a year’s time. And after getting elected to the parliament in 1997 the labour government swiftly made amends to the act removing the stringent measures enacted by it depriving genuine homelessness. A comprehensive housing for all measure was drawn up in April 2000 which was the first one of its kind seen in the last 23 years delivering a promise of a decent home for all (DETR, 2000a). All these changes and other reforms were set out on a Housing Green Paper and consultations were initiated with about 1, 099 individuals and organizations inviting and recording their responses (DETR, 2000b). Subsequently on 13 December 2000 the Government released the Housing Policy Statement: The way forward for housing (DETR, 2000c) elaborating its intentions after taking into consideration the responses received to its Housing Green Paper. Homelessness Policy in 21st Century The reforms proposed towards the homelessness legislation are already receiving the focused attention of the parliament which published a new homelessness bill in 2001. The bill in particular had the following agenda: People in dire need who are unintentionally homeless should be provided with a temporary home until they get a new permanent home. The local authorities should utilize their own housing stock for the purpose of providing temporary accommodation to homeless people till a long-term proposition is made available to them. Give more flexibility to local authorities in deciding the award of temporary accommodation to non-priority homeless families and individuals. Foster a more strategic solution to the total removal of the epidemic of homelessness. Voluntary Organizations like Shelter openly welcomed this Homelessness Bill and stated further that this modern approach to homelessness would pave the way for prevention than cure of crisis situation created by homelessness. It also stated that it will not only act as a statutory authority to prevent homelessness forever but will also serve the twin long term objective of the Government addressing the issue of social exclusion. Also the requirement of a closely knit approach by social services and local authorities responsible for housing, as dictated by the letter and spirit of the bill, has ensured that it does not affect and distress vulnerable individuals due to conflicts and interminable arguments between the two bodies. As recent as March 2002, the British Government started the Homelessness Directorate in England overseen by Lord Jeffrey Rooker, Minister of State for the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister for Housing, Planning and Regeneration. A special website is dedicated towards this step which explicitly states that the department has assembled a homelessness team combined with Rough Sleepers Unit and the Bed and Breakfast Unit directing local authorities on homelessness strategies. The three are supported across government departments by a Policy, Communications and a Secretariat Team to ensure that related policies and legislation help prevent and tackle homelessness. A separate Finance and Performance & Monitoring Team drives the front line delivery teams in the Directorate by managing funds to local authorities and voluntary organizations. The team is also responsible for performance monitoring across the Directorate to ensure the set targets and key objectives are indeed met. A report issued by the Department for Transport, Local Government and the Regions in March 2002 outlines the strategic initiatives for tackling the problems of Homelessness prevailing in England. The report also recommends a partnership of local authorities and voluntary organizations as the viable and ideal means of creating the right strategic responses to the initiatives. To bolster these efforts the Government spending has been pegged at a whopping 60 million pounds out of which 45 million pounds will go to local authorities and about 15 million pounds will go to voluntary organizations and this has been earmarked for the years 2004-2005 and 2005-2006. Assessments of efficiency and effectiveness of Government Grants and services will be carried out and the projected results will dictate the future allocation of such funds and grants. Both Scotland and Wales has its own strategy of combating homelessness. Scotland enacted a housing bill in 2001 to setup a homelessness task force and developed a homelessness strategy to negotiate its homelessness problems. Even Wales, in 2001, finalized its National Housing Strategy through its National Assembly which saw a Homelessness Commission advising the National Assembly on ways and means to alleviate homelessness and improve poor housing in Wales. About a dozen main voluntary organizations, including names like Shelter and Carr-Gromm work together on policy initiatives and programs to solve UK homelessness issues. In fact the mentioned organization takes care each year of over 1, 00, 000 homeless and badly housed people in England and Scotland. The organization is spread across Britain with a toll-free helpdesk to provide information on housing options and extend advocacy on housing rights. Like this they have around fifty housing advocacy projects across the country. Apart from these it helps families transitioning from homelessness to a new home as well as out reaches those homeless on streets. While Shelter offers the above services, Carr-Gromm also provides a wide range of housing and support services in England and Scotland, predominantly for individuals with mental, physical and emotional disabilities or difficulties. The services offered include shared housing, temporary facilities before they move on to own apartments, and work training. The Future Though issues surrounding homelessness have been thoroughly explored in terms of the actual causes of homelessness in the United Kingdom, there are still some lacunae in understanding issues behind the subpopulation of homeless people. Success has been achieved in terms of policy alleviations and amalgamations to better serve the needs of homeless and there is enough evidence of amelioration in the status of majority of homeless but not all of them have been completely taken care of for eternity. More intensive foraying into the issues of homelessness deserves abject attention of local authorities, governments which has to be suitably backed up by untiring efforts from voluntary social organizations who together should devise innovative strategies and implement measures drawn up to comprehensively tackle the still persisting problems of homelessness in the United Kingdom. REFERENCES Alcock, Peter., Erskine, Angus., May, Maragaret., Social Policy Association (Great Britain), 2003, Student’s Companion to Social Policy, Blackwell Publishing. Bhugra, Dinesh., 1996, Homelessness and Mental Health, Cambridge University Press. Cloke, Paul J., Milbourne, Paul., Widdowfield, Rebekah., 2002, Rural Homelessness: Issues, Experiences and Policy Responses, The Policy Press, pp. 85-90. Geographical Abstracts, 1995, Elsevier / Geo Abstracts, Original from University of Michingan. Hallett, Graham., 1993, The New Housing Shortage: Housing Affordability in Europe and USA. Holstein, James A., Gubrium, Jaber F., 2007, Handbook of Constructionist Research, Guilford Press. Kennet, Patricia., 2004, A Handbook of Comparative Social Policy, Edward Elgar Publishing. Levinson, David 2004, ‘Encyclopedia of Homelessness’, SAGE, pp. 575-577. May, Maragaret., Page, Robert M., Brunsdon, Edward., 2001, Understanding Social Problems: Issues In Social Policy, Blackwell Publishing. Pacione, Michael., 2005, Urban Geography: A Global Perspective, Routledge, pp. 51, pp. 190-193, Sabatier, Paul A., 2007, Theories of the Policy Process, Westview Process. Read More