There are more than ten times as many women sleeping rough than are identified through official government ‘snapshot’ counts, according to a new census report.
The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government snapshots fail to classify women sleeping in places like public transport or A&E departments as rough sleeping, says How do we sleep at night? – a joint project by Change Grow Live with Crisis, Solace and the Single Homeless Project. ‘The government is not looking in the right places,’ says the report, with ‘faulty’ figures the result of gender-biased collection methods.
The research, which was conducted across almost 90 council areas, found that nearly 78 per cent of women were not getting support from a housing officer or local authority housing team, with more than 40 per cent not in touch with a homelessness service. The report is based on surveys with women who’d identified themselves to outreach teams or other services as having slept rough in the last three months, as well as information shared at cross-sector meetings. More than 1,000 women were identified as having slept rough in the previous three months, with more than 70 per cent reporting sleeping on the street. Over half reported sleeping in a place that would not be included in the traditional snapshot counts, with a quarter saying they’d stayed with a stranger or new acquaintance, clearly placing them ‘at risk of harm’. A third of women reported feeling physically unsafe, with some providing ‘harrowing reports of gender-based violence, abuse and exploitation’.
Women’s homelessness is compounded by ‘systemic neglect’, the document says, with policies, services, funding and data collection methods all failing to ‘adequately recognise and respond to women’s experiences – because they are designed for men’. Rough sleeping is ‘rarely a standalone experience’ for women, it says, with many oscillating between rough sleeping and other forms of homelessness on a regular basis, making siloed approaches to the problem ‘particularly ineffective’. Joined up strategies are vital, it stresses, including in the forthcoming violence against women and girls strategy – so that women ‘can get housing and support wherever they turn’.
‘Accommodation services aren’t designed for women’s needs,’ the report continues, and calls on the government to ensure that services are ‘accessible, safe, and equitable for women’, backed up by funding. The government also needs an ‘informed definition of rough sleeping that reflects women’s hidden, transient and intermittent experiences’, as well as to invest in early intervention and provide local authorities with the resources and guidance to collect accurate data on women sleeping rough.
‘Our findings bring home how many women are victimised whilst sleeping rough and that homelessness services are not sufficiently resourced to respond effectively to their needs,’ said Sam Wright, who wrote the report for Change Grow Live. ‘It’s concerning that the women responding to the census were more likely to have accessed drug and alcohol services than other health services, given that we know how many have serious health problems. So much needs to be done to improve our support for women. I think this year we have a real opportunity to bring about genuine change.’
The government recently confirmed that it would decriminalise rough sleeping by repealing the 200-year-old Vagrancy Act by next spring. A cross-government homelessness strategy is expected later this year.
Report available here