Homelessness is predictable, but not inevitable - Ewan Aitken

Ewan Aitken, CEO Cyrenians ScotlandEwan Aitken, CEO Cyrenians Scotland
Ewan Aitken, CEO Cyrenians Scotland
Last week I had a wonderful lunch out on Cyrenians farm. It was memorable for both the food (which included salad from the farm) and the company

They were the first young people on our new “green skills” programme, a new offer which includes a qualification for young people who struggled at school to help them into college or work.

It’s all part of our homelessness prevention work, supporting people whose circumstances mean they are more likely to become homeless to avoid reaching crisis point.

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On Tuesday, Scotland’s homelessness statistics were released. 40,685 homelessness applications were made in 2023-24, with 16,330 households having spent time in temporary accommodation – the highest they have been in over ten years.

When you are running a country, numbers are a useful way to quantify a problem and it is undeniable that these statistics can help those not intimately effected by this crisis to understand the urgency of Scotland’s housing emergency.

However, as a population, we cannot lose sight of what every one of those numbers represents – real people who are being badly let down, living in limbo with potentially devastating consequences for their health or employment prospects

In tough times I want to believe ‘things can’t get worse’. Unfortunately, things can always get worse.

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If the young people I was speaking to weren’t given the opportunity to build relationships with trusted adults and develop skills which may help them in later life, the likelihood of them becoming part of those statistics is high.

The cost of housing services is secondary to the human cost of this crisis. The quality of a person’s life should not be defined by budgets, but as we as a country face yet another economic squeeze it is important for people in positions of power to weigh up the impact of investment.

So Cyrenians decided to try to quantify the different ways we are currently tackling this problem. We commissioned Policy Scotland to examine case studies which looked at the cost of temporary accommodation in Edinburgh – from first presentation to when the household finds settled accommodation. The average cost of this support is £23,265 per household.

If this cost led to the best outcomes possible for people, it would be money well spent. But the right support at the right time can keep people in their homes or help them cope with change so that housing doesn’t become a crisis issue. This is almost always better than forcing people into temporary accommodation and a homelessness system that is already stretched to its limits.

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In comparison, the cost of supporting a household to stay in their current residence is on average £2910 per household. Edinburgh Council’s Early Intervention team – and charities like us – currently do this by helping people budget, support them to find mental health services or anything else that might be hindering their ability to sustain a tenancy.

Every time we stop someone becoming homeless, we save taxpayers money, but more importantly, like those young people I met on our farm, we help folk flourish instead.

We need more homes, yes, but we cannot build our way out of a housing crisis.

People like the group at Cyrenians farm just need the right kind of support, at the right time and their lives can take a turn for the better.

Homelessness is predictable, but not inevitable and only significant investment in prevention can guarantee that.

Ewan Aitken is CEO of the Cyrenians​​

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