Long term rough sleepers will be given a council property in Sheffield and support to have their own home

The council is providing an initial 30 properties – and hopes to increase this to 50 – with open-ended support for recurrently homeless people with high and complex needs.

There will be wraparound care from agencies to help with drug and alcohol problems plus a dedicated mental health nurse will visit people in their own homes.

During the first lockdown, the Government instructed local authorities to house all rough sleepers with immediate effect and 197 people in Sheffield were placed in emergency accommodation, including hotels.

Suzanne Allen of Sheffield Council told a scrutiny meeting: “These are humans, these are individuals. They’ve got a whole life ahead of them and it’s about their life plan, their goals and aspirations, it’s not just about getting a roof over someone’s head for a crisis.

“We want to get away from the hotel model but take all the benefits and give people a better chance of having a successful life going forward.”

Ms Allen said a lot of work would be done to avoid any impact on communities. “We do need to work very closely with the communities to explain what we’re doing and why we’re doing it.

“The reality is that people who’ve got drug and alcohol use issues are living out in neighbourhoods, they don’t all live in the town centre.

“We’ve got to be very clear that these are adults who’ve got rights and responsibilities, and we’re going to work with them.

“It isn’t a free for all, it’s about saying, if you’re ready now to take those steps, this is what you need to do and this is how we will help.

“They go periodically through tenancies, they go through supported housing, they might go back on the streets – that whole cycle of despair.

“We’re trying to make sure they’re living in a very supported way rather than being left for a crisis to happen and then we scoop them up again.”

The new service, called Housing First, is Government funded.

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