Manchester Receives £3 Million Funding Boost to Combat Homelessness on World Homelessness Day
Manchester, October 10, 2024 – Manchester City Council has welcomed a notable £3 million funding injection from the Government, announced today on World Homelessness Day, to bolster its ongoing efforts to prevent and address homelessness across the city. The funding, allocated for the 2025/26 and 2026/27 financial years, recognizes the sustained pressures faced by Manchester and other areas grappling with housing insecurity.
The Council intends to maximize the impact of the funds through a multi-pronged approach. Approximately £550,000 will be distributed as grants to organizations within the city’s Voluntary, Community and Faith sector, directly supporting individuals experiencing or at risk of homelessness. Details of these grant allocations will be released shortly.
Further investment will focus on assisting individuals currently in temporary accommodation to transition into settled homes. A portion of the funding will also be used to adapt existing temporary accommodation to better meet the needs of residents with physical disabilities and other specific requirements, addressing a growing demand.
The funding will also support vulnerable populations, including 180 care leavers who will be provided with housing in shared rented accommodations, preventing them from facing homelessness.
Efforts to optimize existing social housing stock will also be prioritized, including a crackdown on tenancy fraud, initiatives to bring empty homes back into use, and support for residents to “right size” their housing, freeing up larger properties for families in need.
Council Leader Cllr Bev Craig emphasized the Council’s commitment to tackling the crisis: “Tackling the homelessness crisis is one of Manchester’s biggest priorities and – working with our community partners across the city – we are turning the tide. We welcome today’s extra funding boost from Government which, nationally, adds an extra £84 million to the billion that was committed earlier in the year.”
Cllr Craig highlighted the Council’s progress, stating, “In Manchester, we are working tirelessly to prevent people from becoming homeless in the first place through early help, and to ensure anyone who does become homeless gets the support they need to build new lives in settled homes. It’s good to see that we are bucking the national trend by reducing the number of families in temporary accommodation and effectively eradicating the use of B&Bs for families.”
She added, “A big part of our efforts are focussed on building a record number of council, social and genuinely affordable homes for Manchester people. We are also determined to make the best use we can of the 70,000 council and social homes we already have.”
Acknowledging the collaborative nature of the work, Cllr Craig concluded, ”Homelessness remains a big challenge and one we cannot tackle on our own. On World Homelessness Day we pay tribute to the amazing charity and voluntary groups in our city who share our mission to end avoidable homelessness in Manchester.”
