We’re making progress, but there is much more to do

By Richard Gammage, outgoing Chief Executive of Stoll Housing and co Chair of the Cobseo Housing Cluster

Early next month, I’ll be stepping down from my role at Stoll. It has been a pleasure and a privilege during my tenure to have led Stoll, co chaired the Housing group and championed the No Homeless Veterans campaign.

An earlier phase of the campaign was undertaken in 2019, working predominantly with local authorities, briefing them on how to identify and support veterans experiencing homelessness.

Recognising the changing needs of veterans and the sharp rise in demand for support due to the Covid pandemic and the cost of living crisis, towards the end of 2021 we secured funding from Forces in Mind Trust to relaunch and reinvigorate the campaign. This current phase was launched at the House of Lords in May 2022.

The story so far

Since then, working with our partners at Homeless Link, we have produced a comprehensive set of practical guides and examples of best practice to help organisations support veterans in need. With free resources tailored for England, Scotland and Wales, and for local authorities, housing associations and supported housing providers, we have provided housing staff with the necessary information and tools to drive down veterans’ homelessness.

Over the past few months, we’ve been running online training sessions to explain how these resources can be used. Recordings of these sessions are freely available and we strongly encourage people to make use of them within their organisations.

We have spoken about the campaign at a number of events too, some of which were organised by our other campaign partner the National Housing Federation. The National Housing Summit and the National Smaller Housing Associations’ Conference provided perfect platforms for us to extend our reach.

We also addressed the Armed Forces Covenant Community Conference, and earlier this month we ran a joint webinar with the Local Government Association.

All these opportunities have allowed us to explain why some veterans experience homelessness, the scale and scope of the problem, the range of support that’s available to veterans, and the practical approaches that should be adopted to ensure no veteran slips through the net and on to the streets.

An important Government commitment

Shortly before Christmas, we were invited to 10 Downing Street to meet Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Minister for Veterans’ Affairs Johnny Mercer. At the meeting, the Government announced new funding of £8.5m over two years, to end homelessness among our Armed Forces veterans.

The funding will help several frontline charities, including Stoll, deliver specialist support services in over 900 housing units across the country. This means that organisations like ours can continue to offer health, education and employment support, and ensure veterans in need can get back on their feet. Our very existence is at risk and such funding as well as better use of the assets at our disposal will surely help.

The money will also fund a referral scheme to help veterans at immediate risk of homelessness, enabling them to access supported housing faster and more easily. As the announcement was made, Johnny Mercer stated: ‘we remain steadfastly committed to ending veteran homelessness in 2023’.

These commitments are extremely welcome. We now eagerly await detail on the funding mechanism.

A parting message

All of the progress we have made gives me hope for the future. But we must all do more to ensure those who have served the nation get the help and support they need.

We have a duty of care to support people as they leave military life. The Armed Forces Covenant is a promise from the nation that people who’ve served in the military, and their families, are treated fairly. Despite this, we are still seeing too many veterans struggling to access housing support.

Most people leaving the Armed Forces do make a successful transition into civilian life. But there are many who don’t. Every year, up to 4,000 veterans are in housing need, and it is thought that up to 400 are sleeping rough.

This is not good enough. Just one is one too many.

As I hand over to colleagues, then, I encourage all those who are able to play a part in ending homelessness among veterans to deliver on commitments, to maintain the momentum of this important campaign, and to make use of the resources we’ve made available.

We’re making progress but there’s much more to do….