The Council has adopted the Homeless Bill of Rights but very little has been done to implement it. Set up a group including councillors to examine each aspect of the council’s operations affecting homeless people, audit the extent that it is compliant with the spirit as well as the letter of the Homeless Bill of Rights, and effect reforms to bring it into line. The key here is that true attention to people who are homeless and their individual rights and needs involves some administrative inefficiency; the council’s systems must where necessary be tolerant to this.

Therefore We Demand Full Implementation of the Homeless Bill of Rights

Full information on the homeless bill of rights can be found on campaign lead David Thomas’s website: homelessrights.org.uk.

Since the last election and because of campaigning from organisations like ourselves demanding more in-house emergency & temporary accommodation, we have seen around 250 temporary accommodation homes being purchased by Brighton and Hove City Council & brought back in-house and local authority owned. This has been a welcome change to the default private sector model which has seen a large number of evictions, poor tenant satisfaction and expensive for the local authority. 

Purchasing, Building New Modern Emergency Accommodation Facilities in order to Phase Out the private sector existing providers. 

Selective Licensing and New Rules around Landlords and HMOS, Fire Safety – Effectively managed and “tough time” approach on rogue landlords as we have seen from the much publicised legal case where Brighton and Hove City Council fined a HMO Landlord £13,600. 

Paul Williams National Organiser from Acorn Renters Union spoke about this issue recently at the Action on Homes Conference, Check out Pauls Speech here.

Following years of horror stories & case studies from people experiencing homelessness and living in hostel type short term temporary accommodation. Started by Justlife and the Shared Health Foundation “A cross-party movement at Westminster improving the health, lives and experiences of families and single adults living in temporary accommodation across England.”

Formed in early 2022 and currently active, the APPG aims to improve the health, lives and experiences of families and single adults living in temporary accommodation across England. Using insights from lived experience the APPG will present solutions to the national Hidden Homelessness situation. Check out the APPG For Temporary Accommodation Website for more information on the aims and membership.

Jim Deans from Sussex Homeless Support has recently said “The Pod (first home): SHS built it 80% finished, all 3 parties viewed its building and some even helped. Brighton University viewed it at various stages and were involved in planning. It was set to a Success to the city and a real answer to fast building quality homes. It has laid in storage 2 years and every application for a site in Brighton & Hove has met with objections or silence by BHCC. I viewed it this week and have photos, it looks like they day we moved it but with a coating of dirt that will wash off. Everything we did was right. That must be treated as a priority to think out the box as Brighton & Hove used to.”

We have been campaigning for many years it seems, as have Arch Healthcare from a medical standpoint, and we have had petitions adopted by the council more than once for this, and yet nothing happens. There must be a facility that is open to the public (not just a telephone number) 24/7 that can triage people, provide immediate accommodation if needed, and assess them for all the council’s and NHS services without delay. Article 2 of the Homeless Bill of Rights says that no-one should ever have to sleep rough; without such a point of access we cannot be said to provide this.

Jim  Deans SHS recently commented: “I would elaborate on the 24 x 7 triage by the community involved in this, just look what the community has done with very little government involvement and some of that was negative at the start. We have over 1000 Ukrainians living in our area and they have integrated completely due to “community taking the lead”.

Dr Tim Worthley at the Action on Homes Conference said “

“What we want for the city because we’re, as I say painfully aware of what we’re not doing, this is a map just to show where some of the different settings are in the city, for people who need to access health support and we find that in the average day someone might need to walk as many six miles just to get to a few different  services. We believe very firmly that that’s not good enough, that it’s unfair that it’s introducing barriers and it makes trying to get out of homelessness, it makes that a full-time job and let alone all the  other things you need to do just to stay  alive and to stay safe.”

“What we would argue needs to happen and we can talk about this a bit more later, we think there needs to be a Homeless Healthcare Hub in Central Brighton that  brings all of these teams together, that has a GP service, that has a mental health  service, that has a community nursing service they would be with us, we would want some  misuse workers with us, the health  engagement team and we’d like to host  housing workers and benefits advisors  and social workers and it could be a real Hub of activity. We could run courses, run classes, there’d be a Cafe there.” Read Dr Tim Worthley’s Full Speech at the Action on Homes Conference here.

Jess & Matt from the Museum of Homelessness, which is a wonderful organisation SET UP AND RUN BY PEOPLE WITH LIVED EXPERIENCE who are A NATIONAL PROJECT TO REMEMBER THOSE WHO HAVE DIED whilst experiencing homelessness. Their recent freedom of information requests showed Brighton and Hove have a serious problem with Homeless Housed Deaths, with some 72 people dying whilst housed and homeless within a two year period, including the recent sad news another young LGBTQ+ Homeless Housed Human Took his own life.

We are demanding the next administration Record, Investigate & Learn from these homeless housed deaths. We demand you find polices and solutions to stop people needlessly dying whilst homeless and housed. 

Press & Evidence:

Brighton: Council accused of ‘dumping’ homeless in neighbouring towns\

East Sussex Council Council Report into Homeless Deaths In Kendal Court July 2021

East Sussex Council Council Report into Homeless Deaths In Kendal Court September 2021

We are supporting demands  for in-house council owned specific homeless accommodation by LGBTQ+ Community Members experiencing Homelessness in Brighton and Hove following reports of; Hate Crimes, Isolation & Deaths. 

LGBT SWITCHBOARD have produced a manifesto which is not public yet, but was derived from a well attended conference last year, and focused on Safe Spaces, Provision for Older People, Provision for those suffering homelessness to name just a few areas.   

These demands are in line with the City of Sanctuary Accreditation the city have adopted and subscribed too.  

There really seems to be very little of this happening in Brighton. We see examples of public land being sold and newly built homes and developers trying to get out of the affordable homes requirements, many with payments, which are often far less and often include large profits for developers, but the communities lose the land, resources, and services, in a city which is dominated by the private sector. Another example was the former priory house council housing building, which is now short term air bnb style lets, raking in up to £250 per night for the private sector organisation who own and manage the properties.

The Community Need A Voice & Say:

The General Hospital Site which is publicly owned would make an ideal Homeless Healthcare Hub, we have a similar vision to Arch Healthcare and many stakeholders, that the need for a Homeless Healthcare Style Hub, With decent Detox Services and a decent mix of Short, medium and long term homes, would be good for those experiencing homelessness, great for local healthcare and organisations as less and less will become homeless and of those who do, we would have state of the art preventative, reactive and patient/person centred community wealth building services, which, can only save money and even in the long term make money from rent and council tax receipts, and savings from spendings elsewhere, for examples See Tim Worthley’s Speech & Evidence here: Tim Worthley Calls For A Homeless Healthcare Hub in Brighton and Hove.

Converting Underused Business Spaces Such as Retail Shops and Former Banks, like RBS Bttm North Street into council owned / partnership homes.

The HROB is just a place where officials announce their policies; attendance is very poor because it is not a place for genuine discussion. It is useless for community involvement. The reason is that no councillors are present so the officers have it all their own way.

We Demand  a committee/working group which includes councillors, officials, voluntary sector, and community organisations – a CAGH but on a more permanent and resourced basis – where real issues can be discussed and the activist community can have their say.

Spend on AREA PANELS vs the Resident Involvement, 4 residents in East Panel in Dec 2023, 10 officers. Lack of diversity & inclusion of Council Tenants including those currently experiencing homelessness.