Homelessness: Local Authority Spending

Lord Bird Excerpts

Thursday 2nd May 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth]

My Lords, the noble Lord and I did indeed exchange views on this previously. The difference in the way spending is dealt with is that the ring-fence was taken off in 2009—actually under the Labour Government. It carried on like that through the coalition years, with which the noble Lord will be familiar, and still remains the case. We need also to focus on the fact that money is spent centrally, in addition to what is spent locally. The £100 million announced in August last year is beginning to have an effect. To take an example of an authority, in Brighton and Hove there were 178 rough sleepers in 2017; in 2018, there were 64. Admittedly there are nuances of difference in the way the figures are calculated, but not enough to account for that significant difference. That spending is going on, and we have a Minister dedicated to this area of activity.

[Lord Bird (CB)]

My Lords, the Minister will agree that one of the most important things with regard to homelessness is churn. If people fall homeless then they should be moved on. Has the Minister looked at the possibility of adopting the PECC method, which I have talked to him about? It is about prevention, emergency, coping and cure. He could then look at the money spent on the projects: is it keeping people lingering in the limbo of homelessness, preventing them becoming homeless or helping them to get out? We have to use something like the PECC method. It is free to the Minister—I invented it; there is no cost.

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth]

It is good to hear from the noble Lord. I pay tribute to what he does on the rough sleeping advisory committee; I know that he is doing very worthwhile work. There is much to commend PECC, as he says. Yesterday, I was in Redbridge, which is adopting Project Malachi, which we are helping to fund and which is connected with work. This sort of thing is the way forward. It is not the total answer, as I am sure the noble Lord will agree, but it certainly makes a big difference.