Issue - meetings

To consider a revised and updated Worcestershire County Homelessness Strategy.

(Report attached – appendix available in Party Group rooms and via the Council website)

The Council was required to have a Homelessness Strategy in accordance with the Homelessness Act 2002. The draft Countywide Strategy before Members had been created by a Project Team of Officers from across Worcestershire.

The Strategy had been produced during a period of great change, largely as a consequence of the prevailing economic conditions, and it considered how austerity measures might adversely impact on homelessness and the measures that were needed to mitigate the impact of these. The Committee was pleased to note that the Council had been singled out at various points within the report as an example of best practice within the County group.

There was considerable discussion around the relative provision of temporary accommodation within the different Districts of Worcestershire and surrounding areas and instances of families or individuals from outside the Borough being housed in Redditch accommodation. Officers explained that the Borough had the lowest homeless acceptance rates in the County as a result of the proactive steps taken by Officers to prevent homelessness. There were occasions, however, when Redditch accepted homeless people from outside the Borough in exceptional circumstances and this arrangement was reciprocated across the County and further afield. Officers were in the process of developing a Protocol with other Local Authorities to address this issue and offered to circulate it to members of the Committee following the meeting.

RESOLVED that

the Draft Countywide Joint Homelessness Strategy and action plan attached at Appendix 1 to the report be approved.