Wolverhampton North East MP Jane Stevenson has welcomed news that Wolverhampton City Council is to receive an additional £390,000 to tackle rough sleeping this year, supporting some of the most vulnerable people in the community.
The Government has announced that councils will receive a share of an additional £112 million through the Rough Sleeping Initiative to help get people off the streets and into safe and secure accommodation.
An extra £236 million will also fund ‘move on’ accommodation for up to 6,000 rough sleepers, ensuring no one has to sleep on the streets at night.
The latest figures show that rough sleeping across England fell by 9 per cent last year – the second annual fall in a row, and by 12 per cent in local authority areas where the Rough Sleeping Initiative is active. The scheme is a central pillar of the Government’s strategy to end rough sleeping completely by 2024.
Jane Stevenson said: “It is fantastic to see that funding to tackle rough sleeping in Wolverhampton will be boosted by £390,000 this year.
“The Government has shown that it is absolutely determined to end rough sleeping, and I was particularly pleased to see the Government bringing forward its target for achieving this from 2027 to 2024 at the last election.
“But there is still a lot more to do, and I’ll be working with the council and local organisations to ensure the additional funds are spent in the most effective way, so that no one in our city has to sleep out in the cold.”
Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick MP said: “I’m determined that we end rough sleeping in this Parliament, meeting our moral obligation to support the most vulnerable in society.
“We will be bringing together housing, addiction, mental health and the criminal justice system as never before to tackle this social ill from every angle. The coordinated effort that we will now pursue, beginning with this review, builds on the progress we have made in recent years, reducing the number of people sleeping on the streets.”
