Resettlement Units for Homeless (Hansard, 19 March 1985)

§ Lord Kilmarnock
My Lords, I beg leave to ask the second Question standing in my name on the Order Paper.

§ Lord Glenarthur
My Lords, the process of regional consultation with local authorities, voluntary bodies and others to identify alternative resettlement arrangements is just beginning. No resettlement units will be closed until the results of that process are known.

§ Lord Kilmarnock
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for that reply. Does he not agree that local authority housing and social service departments would be very hard put to it to step in under the present regime of local authority finance, and also that the voluntary movement has neither the capacity nor the resources to run 24-hour direct access, off-the-street shelters for these unfortunate people? Does he not agree that this, at least, should remain a statutory obligation? Can he tell us whether he would have to bring in primary legislation in order to bring about this change?

§ Lord Glenarthur
My Lords, my right honourable friend the Secretary of State has a statutory obligation to supply either the space, in the form of resettlement units, or the finance for doing it. What is happening in this case is that the finance is being transferred to the voluntary agencies, which are better able to supply what the noble Lord so much wants to see.

§ Lord Avebury
My Lords, can the noble Lord give an assurance that in Greater London no action will be taken to close Camberwell until the replacement scheme is completed, or, indeed, to close any of the existing seven units in the capital? What additional provision does he think it is necessary to make in the capital to cater for the many hundreds of people who are now sleeping rough on the streets?

§ Lord Glenarthur
My Lords, in regard to Camberwell, the joint Department of the Environment and DHSS package agreed in 1981, which is known as the Camberwell replacement scheme, and which I know the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, is familiar with, is more than a replacement for the Camberwell resettlement unit, which currently accommodates about 200 men. It entails the provision of a London-wide basis of 985 new bed spaces, 403 primarily by voluntary agencies for the single homeless. Some ex-residents of London resettlement units such as those to which he referred are already being housed in schemes which have opened. All the bed spaces are due to be available by 1987, so we believe that it is sensible to draw from this exercise lessons for the homeless in London generally before deciding on the future resettlement provision in the capital. But I can assure the noble Lord that no one will be cast out on to the streets.

§ Baroness Jeger
My Lords, can the noble Lord explain why his noble friend Lord Avon told me on 24th January, in reply to a Question, that the Government have no information about the number of homeless people and that local authorities have specific duties to provide appropriate assistance? When I ask local authorities about what assistance they are providing the only response I get is that because of rate capping they cannot provide this assistance. If the Government do not know how many people are sleeping rough, why do they close these places which provide people with somewhere to go? Surely it is quite wrong, if the Government do not know how many people are homeless, that they should shut down the places where there is at least some shelter.

§ Lord Glenarthur
My Lords, what the noble Baroness perhaps does not take into account in asking that question is that many of the old resettlement units were too big; they were too old-fashioned; they were in the wrong place; and they had the wrong sort of staff running them. I should have thought that the best way to spend the money that is available for that sort of thing is to put it to the good use of the voluntary agencies, which are much better organised in this respect and are capable of providing the service which the noble Baroness so badly wants.

Lord Winstanley
My Lords, the noble Lord has told the House that none of these units would be closed until the discussions to which he referred were completed. Is it not the fact that the unit at Fazakerley on Merseyside and the one at Walkden in Greater Manchester have in fact already been closed? Indeed, if they have not actually closed, is it not true that they are no longer functioning, which amounts to the same thing?

§ Lord Glenarthur
My Lords, they will not close until such time as the new arrangements have been made and that particular consultation process has been completed. To turn to Fazakerley, I think that the position is that the unit required a great deal of capital works and it may for some reason be uninhabitable at present. I am not sure of the particular circumstances of that unit but I shall certainly check up and let the noble Lord know.

§ Baroness Jeger
My Lords, instead of directing questions to the fact that some of these places are not full, should we not be asking why they are not full? It may be that people are not attending because there is something wrong with the centres. Why do we not try to find out why people who are sleeping on the streets 404 do not go to these DHSS centres? There must be something wrong with the DHSS places. That is the question that I put to the noble Lord the Minister.

§ Lord Glenarthur
My Lords, the noble Baroness asks me why we are going to close these places, and at the same time she is suggesting that perhaps there is something wrong with them. It is precisely for that reason that we are diverting the financial resources, which up till now have gone to these units, to the voluntary organisations in the hope that they will be more successful than the DHSS units have been up till now.

§ Lord Kilmarnock
My Lords, the noble Lord says that the voluntary agencies are better able to provide this service. I ask him to read the very interesting briefing paper issued by the Campaign for Single Homeless People—CHAR—which says: The experience of voluntary organisations running nightshelters, crash-pads etc. is that they cannot properly meet the needs of the homeless people". Will the noble Lord take that into account in his discussions? Will he say whether the whole of the £12 million annually which is at present outgoing on this service, and the £8 million that the Government plan to save on maintenance, will all be made available for the replacement scheme?

§ Lord Glenarthur
My Lords, as regards the first part of the noble Lord's supplementary, it is generally accepted—and I think that if he asks about it he will find that this is the case— by those who care for people without a settled way of life, that the resettlement process is more likely to succeed in smaller, informally run hostels or homes, than in the larger institutions, such as resettlement units. That has been confirmed by the department's monitoring of those voluntary projects in receipt of funding under Schedule 5 to the Supplementary Benefits Act. The noble Lord would do well to bear in mind that this process will take quite some time to complete. So far as charges are concerned, I can tell him that all the financial provisions which are made for DHSS units will be made available to the voluntary ones in the future, if they come about.