COVID-19 and Homelessness: national policy at the local level
On Friday 25th September 2020, we hosted CHAD’s first interactive webinar since the COVID-19 lockdown. Over 60 delegates attended our online event that focused on our research around the impact on, and support for, people experiencing homelessness during and after COVID-19.
Our team at the Centre for Health and Development (CHAD) have been working with Expert Citizens, VOICES of Stoke-on-Trent and Public Health England (funded by the Big Lottery) to understand the experiences, challenges and needs of people experiencing homelessness and those working to support them.
In this webinar, Victoria Riley presented preliminary findings from the first phase of this work, which involved interviews with a range of individuals representing different organisations/places, from frontline workers, to policy makers. Those attending the webinar, who represented a range of professionals from the NHS, local authority and third sector organisations, general public and academics, heard our findings to date and were then asked to participate in small group discussions, reflecting on our data in light of their broad collective experience and changes to the policy and practice environment in the weeks since our data were gathered. For example: the perceived successes of the Everyone In policy; enforced changes in modes of service provision (advantages/disadvantages); benefits for partnership working at local level; marked variation between areas in how Everyone In was implemented; sustainable solutions (versus crisis response); and the anticipated severity of COVID-19 in people experiencing homelessness versus the apparently low rates of infection and mortality.
The slides showing the preliminary findings can be viewed/downloaded here.
The recorded presentation can be watched below or here.
