You might have read in the Manchester Evening News, or heard on the radio, that Manchester is launching accommodation for people who are rough sleeping when the weather becomes very cold.

Local Authorities put on emergency accommodation for people sleeping rough over the winter. Government guidance says that this should be when the weather is zero degrees for three nights or more. However over the past few years Manchester City Council, working with the Manchester Homeless Partnership, has been testing and evolving its Cold Weather offer to try to manage the dilemma between tight funds and the need to keep people safe.

Last year 'Everyone In' demonstrated just what we could be achieved by accommodating people rough sleeping in the City and providing the support people need to move into longer term accommodation. The partnership has the same ambition this year: to provide accommodation to those who have nowhere else to go and to provide the necessary support once people are in accommodation so that they don’t need to return to the streets.

Manchester City Council is funding the accommodation for rough sleepers this winter and thanks to a Winter Tranformation Fund Grant from Homeless Link, Barnabus is leading a group of partners to deliver vital support around accommodation and complex needs.

 

Barnabus is employing  a Cold Weather Support Co-ordinator to ensure people get help with:

·         mental and physical health thanks to Greater Manchester Mental Health Service

·         access to primary care and Covid vaccines through Urban Village Medical Practice

·         drug and alcohol support thanks to Change Grow Live

·         support for young people through Centrepoint

·         support for women thanks to Manchester Action on Street Health

·         support for those people with no recourse to public funds thanks to Boaz Trust

·         support to continue working with probation through On The Out

·         support for EU & EEA citizens through the Booth Centre

·         social events and activities through Greater Together Manchester

In addition people referred into Cold Weather accommodation can receive help from the council’s Housing Solutions team in finding out if they have a duty to be housed. GM Law Centre and Shelter will be helping people to challenge decisions if we feel they have a duty which hasn’t been understood or recognised.

We’re being bold and ambitious this year because we have long believed that the money spent every year on Cold Weather accommodation can have greater value if we use it to get people housed instead of letting them return to the streets. The evidence from 'Everyone In' and last year’s Cold Weather accommodation tells us we’re right, but we need more data and evidence to show the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities that our innovative approach needs to be the model for the whole country and that we need the funding to make rough sleeping a sad and unnecessary episode in our country’s history.