All I want for Christmas is an end to homelessness (even if I lose my job as a result) – Ewan Aitken

“All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth,” goes the old song. I was never sure if it was a song about a desire for a better smile or improved chewing capacity! Whatever it was, the request was not for anything complicated or expensive, just life-improving.

An end to homelessness still seems some distance in the future (Picture: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)

If I was to be writing a song in similar vein, it would have a similar life-changing theme but for those for whom life’s challenges are far greater than the lack of a couple of teeth. It would also seem a bit contradictory, because it would include a line to the effect of “all I want for Christmas is for my job not to be necessary”.

If we believe as a nation, as has often been said and I have signed up to wholeheartedly, that we want to end homelessness, it means I want not just my job but my whole organisation to no longer be necessary. It’s a strange hope to want to no longer be needed, but if we truly believe in ending homelessness, it's a core part of our ambition.

Of course, if it was as easy as writing a song, we’d have done it by now. Cyrenians has been around for 50 years and journeyed with thousands of people from the tough reality of homelessness into a better place, and supported many more so they didn’t become homeless in the first place. Last year the number we helped was over 7,000, and we expect to support at least as many this year as the cost-of-living crisis continues to grow. Which tells us why, committed as we are to ending homelessness, we will still be around for a while yet.

If I were writing the song, it would include a number of big wishes before we got to the punchline of my job being obsolete:

All I want for Christmas is enough affordable homes for the 14000 people in Scotland in temporary accommodation;

All I want for Christmas is for people who present as homeless to have the support 50 per cent of them need to maintain a tenancy be immediately available for as long as they need it;

All I want for Christmas is land reform to control the price of land and make building affordable homes, well, affordable;

All I want for Christmas is a benefits system which keeps people out of poverty instead of driving them deeper into it;

All I want for Christmas is an end to the stigma of poverty, and real support to lift people out of it on their terms;

All I want for Christmas is support for people facing or experiencing homelessness where success is defined by the person, not by the system, and built on trusted relationships;

All I want for Christmas is for people to get not just a house but a home, and the support they need to flourish in it.

You can see why I never went into songwriting as a career! These are big asks, and the ambitions are complex to achieve, but they’re not complicated. They simply reflect our core values at Cyrenians and our central belief that great things can be achieved if we build human-sized systems which treat people as we would all want to be treated.

Ewan Aitken is CEO of Cyrenians