CUTTING HOMELESSNESS / CUTTING COSTS – A TRICKY BALANCE

City of Edinburgh Council is teaming up with third-sector partners to pilot a new scheme to support people at risk of becoming homeless. 

On the principle that prevention is better (and at least £400,000 cheaper) than cure, CEC will join the Bethany Christian Trust, Edinburgh Cyrenian Trust, Foursquare, and the Community Help and Advice Initiative in delivering guidance on: 

• budgeting and debt
• benefits
• tenancy
• employment, volunteering, education and training
• avoiding social isolation.

Homeless people and those in temporary accommodation will also receive help in finding ‘more sustainable’ places to live in the public and private sectors.

‘By working alongside our third sector partners,’ said CEC Housing Leader Cammy Day yesterday, ‘we can gain from their expertise and deliver the highest standard of support to those who need it across Edinburgh. This way we can tackle the root causes of homelessness ... to build a better future for those at risk and help them to keep their homes.’

Up to a point, Lord Copper

The initiative comes as CEC considers difficult choices about how to save £22m in its 2015–16 budget.

One option, for example, is to review a range of hostels for service redesign. This could result in a reduction of the overall number of bedspaces. However, potential efficiencies and savings of £0.175m would be achieved first through rent restructuring and reduction in staffing capacity.

Elsewhere, the net budget for bed-and-breakfast provision could be cut by 10%, and a further £1.5m be saved by changes to the management of third-sector grants. If agreed, this would follow cuts in the 2014–15 budget of £2.3m.

The dangers of the latter proposal, according to CEC’s budget document (see below, p. 95), are that ‘Reduction in funding could be perceived as a reduction in service’ and that ‘Partners withdraw services as a result of reduction in funding’. This, the document states in optimistic gobbledegook, could be mitigated by ‘Work with partners to agree outcomes and deliverables’.

Our point is: it remains to be seen to what extent the pilot scheme announced yesterday represents a potential improvement to services for the homeless, and/or an exercise in PR damage limitation for the Council.

There are no easy solutions to the problem of homelessness, even at the best of times. However, we agree with those who argue that the most vulnerable in society must be protected, not least because they are all too conveniently overlooked by the rest of us in the interests of political and economic pragmatism.