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Homelessness is a colossal issue, precipitated by a wide array of social determinants, and mirrored in substantial health disparities and a revolving hospital door. Connecting people to safe and secure housing needs to be part of the health system response. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

This mixed-methods paper presents emerging findings from the collaboration between an inner city hospital, a specialist homeless medicine GP service and Western Australia’s inaugural Housing First collective impact project (50 Lives 50 Homes) in Perth. This paper draws on data from hospitals, homelessness community services and general practice.

This collaboration has facilitated hospital identification and referral of vulnerable rough sleepers to the Housing First project, and connected those housed to a GP and after hours nursing support. For a cohort (n=44) housed now for at least 12 months, significant reductions in hospital use and associated costs were observed.

While the observed reductions in hospital use in the year following housing are based on a small cohort, this data and the case studies presented demonstrate the power of care coordinated across hospital and community in this complex cohort.

This model of collaboration between a hospital and a Housing First project can not only improve discharge outcomes and re-admission in the shorter term, but can also contribute to ending homelessness which is itself, a social determinant of poor health.

Coordinated care between hospitals and programmes to house people who are homeless can significantly reduce hospital use and healthcare costs, and provides hospitals with the opportunity to contribute to more systemic solutions to ending homelessness.

The purpose of this paper is to focus on the denial of social support to homeless persons and related societal effects of new local governance arrangements.

Analysis of new data and secondary evaluative and comparative data on the policies, administrative structures and management styles of Copenhagen, Glasgow and Amsterdam have brought better understanding of the elements of local governance arrangements that influence the number of homeless persons who are denied access to services and the number of persons sleeping rough who are not eligible for social support. Theoretical explanations for the impact of governance arrangements on these processes and societal effects are considered.

It appears that while the body of research, reports and policy documents on non-eligibility for homelessness services is growing, legal responses at best remain vague, and policies are still in the process of being developed. Modest progress on policy goals, and even more so on policy instruments, leading to less detrimental outcomes, can be explained by centralising and decentralising trends and the relationships between state and society. The latter may also be indicative of how the increased focus on the legal problems of some EU migrants can be explained.

The two points in time documented for the case studies are relevant in understanding processes underlying the current circumstances of homeless persons and homeless migrants and offer an interdisciplinary insight into governance and politics, law, and public and health service perspectives.

Good policy practice, as this paper shows, can lead to a difference in individual lives.

Much is unknown about considerations inside government. This paper contributes by combining theoretical and insider perspectives.

This study aims to explore homeless-support workers’ perceptions of homeless welfare recipients and their experiences of navigating new conditions placed upon them by UK welfare reform. It examines support workers’ views of the most punitive feature of the welfare system, sanctions, on those recipients.In 2012, the Conservative and Liberal Democrat Coalition Government introduced the largest and most radical overhaul of the UK benefit system, significantly increasing the level of conditionality and sanctions for non-compliance, part of a shift in welfare, suggesting that rights must be balanced by responsibility and the “culture of worklessness” and “benefit dependency” should be addressed.

Welfare reforms in the UK and the increased use of sanctions as part of welfare conditionality are reviewed. Data are collected from eight semi-structured interviews taking place in five housing support groups in the South East and South West of England in 2019–2020. The interviews followed an approach from interpretive phenomenological analysis.

Findings from this study indicate that the government’s reforms serve as a disciplinary measure for the poor, reinforcing inequality and social marginalization. To mitigate the effects would require a comprehensive review of universal credit prior to its full rollout to claimants. Data are analyzed thematically.

Welfare conditionality and welfare reform is well-researched in the UK. There is also a significant volume of research concerning homelessness. This paper, however, fills a gap in research concerning the experiences of those working in housing support agencies working with homeless people in the UK.

Safe, secure and stable housing is central to social, emotional and economic well-being for individuals and families. This is recognised by the United Nations as a fundamental human right, yet when it comes to Indigenous housing individuals disproportionately experience unsafe, unstable and substandard housing. The absence of housing security is therefore a significant contributor to the intergenerational poverty experienced by some Indigenous individuals and families. The long-standing nature of this issue makes it appear intractable and systemic, however, there is increasing evidence that this is not the case, and that governments, working in partnership with Indigenous organisations and communities, can begin to change these dynamics.

This brief is based on an extensive review of the multidisciplinary evidence base, including literature and policy analysis as well as empirical investigation. Sources include research articles, official reports and statistics and scholarly debates, as well as media commentary and debate. These, along with original data sources, are analysed to identify the key policy learnings for a framework for culturally appropriate and sustainable Indigenous housing.