His in-tray features: Covid, mental health, NHS reform…and social care. He’s set to be the most pressured Health Secretary since Lansley.
A report has found that empty commercial and retail buildings, owned by local authorities, could be converted into 19,500 homes.
Ultimately, we have to prevent vulnerable people from ever reaching the streets. We should seize this opportunity to work out how.
The choice facing voters on May 6 is simple: do we accelerate the progress of the last four years, or do we go back to the old failing approach?
Housing First is essential but not sufficient – if there are as many non-UK nationals sleeping on the streets post-Covid as before.
Plus: Bean bags, ping pong tables, and padded pods, in Slough’s swanky new council offices.
The Centre for Social Justice’s new report sets out in detail how the programme could be increased from 2,000 to 16,500 places.
The lesson of the last year is poorer communities are much more vulnerable to the next virus or health emergency.
This is not an easy issue to solve. Rough sleeping is as much a health issue as it is a housing issue – it is often a crisis of addiction and mental health as well.
The fifth in our mini-series of pieces from the Centre for Social Justice on the virus – and aiding those in deep poverty.
Duncan Smith names “five giants”: family breakdown, worklessness, serious personal debt, addiction and educational underachievement.
It needs a clear prevention strategy in place by year-end, to provide a clear framework for local councils, and to roll out the Housing First Programme.
Why shouldn’t councils build the homes needed? We can re-enter the market, using low costs of capital to borrow, and cut out the middleman.
The Chancellor is groping his way, knowing well that the future is unknowable, trying to hold on to as much of the past as he can.
It should build on the success of its Housing First scheme and create a National Housing First Programme.