Agenda item

Report of the Director of Community and Children’s Services.

The Sub-Committee considered a report of the Director of Community and Children’s Services providing detail on the various City of London interventions funded by the Rough Sleeping Initiative grant for the 2021/22 financial year and the following points were made:

·         The Rough Sleeping Initiative (RSI) was launched by the Government in March 2018 with the aim of reducing overall rough sleeping numbers in the 83 local authorities with the highest numbers of people sleeping rough, based on the 2017 rough sleeping snapshot.  On 15 May 2021, the City of London Corporation was notified that it would receive a total of £1,028,677 for the 2021/22 financial year.  This was the largest RSI grant allocation to date and would fund 14 different interventions provided by a minimum of eight organisations.  RSI-funded interventions could be broadly grouped into three categories comprising personnel (both at the City of London Corporation and external); additional resource to sustain or increase capacity somewhere; and service delivery via discreet projects or the work programme.  The Head of Homelessness, Prevention and Rough Sleeping advised that plans to fund a Pathway Liaison Officer within the 2021/22 RSI proposal were currently on hold until the consultation/implementation phase of the Target Operation Model had been completed.  The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, which had recently replaced the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, had been advised about the delay and it was hoped to repurpose any underspend towards supporting other planned interventions within the programme.

·         A Committee Member underlined the need for clarity in reporting the cost and impact of individual interventions within the RSI-funded programme to support the development of a robust programme.  The Head of Homelessness, Prevention and Rough Sleeping confirmed that cost and impact was monitored for each intervention but that reporting mechanisms varied across the programme.  The Chairman observed that individuals experiencing homelessness often benefitted from the support provided by multiple interventions and that it was the collective impact of these interventions which achieved successful outcomes.

RESOLVED, that the report be noted.