Decision

The Council refers customers to whom it has a homelessness prevention or relief duty, and who have housing related support needs to different supported housing schemes. One such scheme is located at X which provides accommodation and support to people who have become or would otherwise be street homeless, and have a Waverley local connection. Residents pay their housing costs by claiming Housing Benefit and the cost of providing support is paid for by the Council from Homelessness Prevention Grant. As YRP owns and manages the accommodation it is not possible for another organisation to provide the support.
Note that a criteria now for HPG is that at least 51% of HPG must be spent 51% on prevention and relief and no more than 49% on temporary or emergency accommodation. With homelessness increasing, it is vital to continue to fund initiatives to prevent/relieve homelessness to protect this grant funding stream.
These bedspaces are key to achieving some of the Council’s strategic objectives to prevent and relieve homelessness and reduce long term rough sleeping in the borough. The Councils objectives align with priorities set out in central government’s newly launched National Plan to End Homelessness. The scheme makes a key contribution to managing homelessness and maintaining emergency accommodation numbers at as low a level as possible, whilst enabling the best outcome for customers.
The cost of this support delivers Best Value because the provider specializes in providing accommodation to this hard-to-reach co-hort whilst providing trauma informed complex need support to tackle alcohol/substance misuse and offending, and support recovery from poor mental health. The scheme provides value for money overall because without it, the Council would incur the costs for 3 households x 52 weeks of the year in B&B where support is not available. At a rate of £55 per night (the cheapest possible rate), the cost of emergency accommodation to the Council would be £20,020 per household or £60,060 per annum for 3 households, compared to a cost of £40,769.49 per year at YRP (year 1) as noted above. It is in the interests of people who are new to the streets to exit quickly before becoming entrenched rough sleepers, who go on to develop complex needs which are costly to them as individuals and to public services. Equally, the scheme can support long term rough sleepers to recover and exit the streets for good. This provision enables local people to access emergency accommodation with specialist support at short notice to rebuild their lives, and aligns with the Corporate Priorities of an inclusive borough, a well-run Council and providing decent and affordable housing.
There is budget available for this non key decision with the Housing Options budget, which was approved as part of the overall corporate budget at Full Council in February 2026.

Reasons for the decision

To continue to run a prudent, sustainable homelessness prevention and relief service, maximize the options available to residents, and minimize expenditure on costly emergency accommodation.

Alternative options considered

MUST be completed / actions explained. If there are no alternative options, state 'None'.
Officers are not able to consider alternative options for the provision of support –the accommodation is owned by X and the support is inextricably tied to the accommodation provided and managed by X.