Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they have made a recent estimate of the number of homeless people sleeping outside without tents or other cover; and what plans they have to eliminate such homelessness.

Tackling homelessness is a complex issue with no single solution, and whilst we do not collect data specifically on the number of people who are rough sleeping without tents or other cover, we are determined to help the most vulnerable in society.

That is why we are providing £1 billion up to 2020 to reduce all forms of homelessness and rough sleeping, and introducing the most ambitious legislative reform in decades through the Homelessness Reduction Act to ensure people get support sooner.

We are providing £28 million to pilot a Housing First approach in three major regions of England. The pilots will support some of the most entrenched rough sleepers off the streets and help them to end their homelessness. The recently established Rough Sleeping and Homelessness Reduction Taskforce will first deliver a cross - Government strategy to halve rough sleeping by 2022 and eliminate it altogether by 2027. However, it will also drive action to reduce wider homelessness and will have within its remit issues such as prevention and affordability.