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This paper aims to illustrate realities of homeless people's lives during a time of significant change in UK public sector funding and welfare policy.

A participatory research approach was used including working with two co‐researchers; two people who have direct experience of homelessness. A sustainable livelihoods approach was adapted to provide a framework for analysis. The research was undertaken during May to October 2011.

The paper interrogates five areas of assets held by people themselves that support sustainable livelihoods, an existing approach used in other research. Life journey narratives show that a connected range of services, operating through an empowerment model, promote human dignity.

Findings resonate with issues identified in larger studies; however, as the funding and policy context is rapidly changing it is recommended that additional local qualitative studies could be conducted during the next three years to illustrate impacts in people's lives.

The paper suggests front‐line services must include resettlement as well as crisis and stabilising services in order to ensure homeless people can successfully move from home to home.

The research identified negative attitudes towards homeless people. By illustrating homeless people's achievements the study provides evidence of the impact of, and the value of continuing to fund, homeless services.

The paper suggests that people who have experienced homelessness achieve a successful life with support by drawing on their considerable life experience and personal talents. This message is important for practitioners, commissioners and policy makers working through a period of change for homeless services.

An increasing literature points to the efficacy and importance of mutual aid groups for people recovering from substance dependency. However, there is a paucity of qualitative evidence into the experiences and perceptions of service users attending UK-based mutual aid groups, and the implications they could have for recovery and mental wellbeing. The paper aims to discuss this issue.

A phenomenological approach was chosen to explore the experiences and perceptions of service users and mentors at a mutual aid group in Leeds. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with service users and mentors (ex-service users) involved with the project. Thematic analysis was used to analyse the data.

This paper focuses on the influence of mutual aid attendance on mental wellbeing. It was found that attendance seemed to have positive influences on providing structure, reducing stress and boredom, “broadening the mind” and providing service users with a social network that supported their recovery and mental wellbeing. However, it was also found that for those that have little outside the project, dependency on the group could develop, resulting in negative consequences on mental wellbeing.

This paper provides an increased understanding of why mutual attendance has influences on mental wellbeing, as well as the implications such impacts have on recovery trajectories.

Abstract This paper is a compilation of four contributions which endeavour to bring together the numerous strands of service user involvement that have been integral to the work, thinking and culture of the National Personality Disorder Development Programme.

This article describes the development of the Stamp Out Stigma campaign developed by service users in Nottinghamshire Healthcare Trust. It highlights the positive benefits the campaign can have for service users, staff and the services they receive and/or in which they work.

The purpose of this paper is to review systematically the available literature relating to the implementation of peer education to promote health and healthy behaviour in prisons.

The authors undertook a narrative systematic review of Medline, EMBASE, CINAHL, Psychinfo, Web of Science and Cochrane databases. Relevant journals and reference lists were hand searched for relevant articles to be included in the review. Of the abstracts found, full‐text papers were retrieved for those papers deemed as possibly fulfilling the inclusion criteria of the review.

A total of 3,033 abstracts were identified leading to 46 full‐text articles being retrieved, of which ten were included in the review. Peer education in prisons can have an impact on attitudes, knowledge, and behaviour intention regarding HIV risk behaviour. The research findings were inconclusive for the impact of peer education upon illicit drug use and injecting practice. There was a paucity of research evaluating the impact of peer education upon mental ill health, obesity, diet, smoking, or self‐management of chronic physical diseases.

Peer education is effective in reducing risk of HIV transmission. It is possible that peer education for mental health issues is stigmatising, presenting an opportunity for further research activity. The impact of peer education upon illicit drug use practice, obesity, diet, smoking, and self‐management of chronic physical diseases also presents further research opportunities. Research evaluating models of active peer educator involvement in health service delivery and organisation is also lacking.

The author provides a personal perspective on personality disorder, based on his involvement with Borderline UK and Personality Plus. This is based on a presentation originally made at the First National Personality Disorder Congress.

This paper aims to describe a novel collaboration between a worker and a former service user in developing two support groups – an art group and an “alcoholics anonymous group” self help group – at a central London “Wet” hostel for the homeless. The paper seeks to explore the issues raised for both workers in this experience.

The paper is a jointly written case study of innovative and reflective practice. It begins with an overview of policy frameworks and research that promote and advocate inclusion practice; then gives an account of the origins and development of the collaboration initiative; and concludes with reflections from each of the participants on what they have gained from the experience.

The main challenge for professionals lies in the need for “self‐reflective” practice and to challenge their own personal investments in the maintenance of their professional role and status. For ex‐service users, the challenge is to overcome low self‐confidence, the safety of the all‐too‐familiar “service user” role, and to realise that, despite real obstacles, a productive, useful contribution can be made to society. This can therefore be seen as a journey for both parties.

Working with multiple exclusion homelessness can leave professionals feeling isolated and deskilled, leading people with complex needs to be further excluded from services that feel that they do not fit their criteria. Tackling these issues requires time for reflection on the personal issues raised.

The paper provides unique learning and insight into the development and running of support groups, resulting from the novel collaboration between a worker and a former service user.

Discriminatory attitudes to (ex) service users may threaten modernisation as they limit and shrink the workforce and prevent committed workers from succeeding. The report of the 1st National Conference of Survivor Workers gives senior managers the knowledge needed to increase the size and capability of the workforce.

The authors of the previous paper “Staff and ex‐service user co‐working: a counselling service's enhanced response to multiple exclusion homelessness” feel that Paul's contribution and achievements can only be fully appreciated with reference to his own story. It is published here, to appear alongside the account of their joint experience of co‐working, as part of the series on personal perspectives on development work. It aims to give an account of one person's journey into homelessness and mental health problems in the context of multiple exclusion and homelessness.

This paper is a biographical account, with personal reflections.

There are no findings as such; this is an account of personal experience. It speaks for itself.

Fully personal accounts are rare, in research journals. Yet personal experience is the bedrock of research, and of outcomes. This account is published here, as a necessary balance to more formal, objective and statistical measures.

Denied by practitioners and erased from all official documents, the requirement that ex‐users be clean for two years before being employed is supposedly no longer with us. But, as Andrew Gordon reveals, despite the denials, the two‐year rule is alive and kicking and doing its best to keep ex‐users out of work.