Opinion-in-brief: We need freedom to solve our housing woes
By reducing demand for social housing, Brexit was supposed to help Boris Johnson deliver his pledge to end homelessness within five years.
Spoiler: it’s not going well.
From 2010 to 2018, the number of rough sleepers more than doubled from 1,768 to 4.677 because of the misguided idea that the homeless need help, instead of empowerment.
Housing First, a pilot program launched in 2017, aims to give agency back to homeless people by stripping back a lot of the criteria needed to secure a home. Designed in New York, it’s currently being trialled in Liverpool. According to the Government’s own study, it works.
Yet, we still often try to solve housing problems in the UK with top-down measures.
The state treats them like a burden, rather than someone with the ability to change their own lives.