Clause 17 - Homelessness reviews
Homes Bill
4:30 pm
Mr Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham, Conservative)
Indeed. Such have been the characteristics of the rough sleepers unit, which was, we are told, launched with great vision in April 1999. It is difficult to avoid taking the cynical view that it is because of the visibility of the issue that tackling rough sleeping has become a key indicator for the Government of their success in tackling social exclusion. It is an easy, high-profile option, hence all the razzmatazz about the rough sleepers' unit.
Members of the Committee have referred during our deliberations to the success of the previous Government. I pay particular tribute to my right hon. Friends the Members for North-West Hampshire (Sir G. Young) and for Skipton and Ripon, both of whom were integral to the rough sleepers initiative, which goes back as far as 1991 under the previous Government. The achievements during the five or six years the rough sleepers initiative was in operation were quite marked and were praised by many quarters, especially by people involved in dealing with homelessness and rough sleepers. Indeed, by the end of 1996, the number of rough sleepers in London was estimated to have decreased from about 1,000 at the beginning of the initiative to 286, of whom very few were below the age of 18.
The previous Government tackled the problem in part by funding 950 additional temporary hostel beds and considerably more beds in permanent accommodation for rough sleepers. The initiative extended beyond London, although, as always, the main problem was in the capital. Rough sleeping initiatives and rough sleeping initiative zones were introduced in Bath—I am sure that the hon. Member for Bath will want to congratulate my colleagues on their achievements there—Manchester, Oxford Brighton, and other areas.
We greeted with some cynicism the announcement that £200 million was to be poured into the rough sleepers unit, which would be headed up by a so-called tsar with a not inconsiderable salary. However, the major criticism has come not from us but from other organisations and individuals involved in dealing with homelessness. Indeed, shortly after its start, Shaks Ghosh, the head of Crisis, described the rough sleepers' unit and gave it 10 out of 10 for intervention, but five out of 10 for prevention. That has indeed been a hallmark of some of its activities. Shaks Ghosh highlighted the danger of individuals being sidelined in the march towards the achievement of the Prime Minister's high-profile targets.
What is being done at a strategic level to prevent rough sleeping in the future and to review the progress that the unit is making? Are the Government tackling in a joined-up way—a phrase we hear so much—problems such as drugs, which are intrinsically linked to rough sleeping? It is estimated that in Soho, in Westminster, some 75 per cent. of crack cocaine consumption is down to rough sleepers.
The rough sleepers unit has come in for a great deal of criticism from other homelessness organisations. Crisis said about that unit that
street clearing, rather than helping the homeless has become the objective of policy.
Cheryl St. Clair is another critic. She has spent 26 years working in various homeless organisations. Although she is on the Christmas card list of my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Miss Widdecombe), she hotly denies that she has any political sympathy with the Conservative party and claims that she is non-political. She said that the biggest problem with the rough sleepers' unit is that
it is political. It is driven by political requirements rather than moral requirements.
She says that the unit has become obsessed with process and lost sight of outcomes for homeless people.
The amendments and the new clause provide a way in which to query value is added by the rough sleepers unit at the not inconsiderable cost of £200 million. I would be interested in hearing the Minister's justification for that. What extra value is brought by that unit that could not be achieved by local authorities adopting strategies for rough sleepers and dealing with the rough sleepers on their own doorstep?