Over 4,000 people are homeless in Yorkshire and 'many more will be joining them', charity warns

Analysis conducted by the charity suggests at least 181 people are sleeping on the region’s streets on any given night, while 3,840 people are living in temporary accommodation and 1,460 of them are children.

Shelter is concerned that many more people could soon find themselves out on the streets, after the Government ended the eviction ban, scrapped the £20-a-week Universal Credit uplift and wound down the ‘Everyone In’ scheme, which provided emergency accommodation for around 37,000 rough sleepers during the pandemic.

Tracey Nathan, Shelter Sheffield Hub Manager, said: “We predicted the pandemic would trigger a rising tide of evictions and Shelter’s services across the country are starting to see the reality of this now.

"We’re helping families and people of all ages who are homeless or on the verge of losing their home.

“It is shameful that more than 4,200 people in Yorkshire and the Humber are without a home, and with Covid protections now gone many more will be joining them.”

In Yorkshire, Kirklees was found to have the highest number (501) of people living in temporary accommodation arranged by the council while Sheffield had the highest number (519) of homeless people overall.

Kirklees Council said the people in temporary accommodation are from 194 different households and it works to "support them into permanent and affordable accommodation either within social housing or the private rented sector".

Tim Renshaw, chief executive of Sheffield-based homeless charity The Archer Project, said there is an urgent need for more “quality social housing” as it provides people with long-term secure accommodation.

“We’re not building quality social housing anywhere near the quantity we need in Britain and that applies locally, too,” he said.

“Until we can do that and can move people into quality local housing, we’re not going to see the numbers decrease.”

He said the number of rough sleepers is expected to increase in the coming years because a decade of austerity in the UK has created “a breeding ground for all the negative conditions” which drive people onto the streets.

“We know that hard-up families have probably suffered more than most. It’s from that background, where people have suffered different levels of trauma within households, that street populations come from,” he said.

Leeds was found to have the highest number of rough sleepers in Yorkshire (89), but the count, which is done by government officials, is widely considered to be an underestimate.

Shelley Joyce, co-founder of Homeless Street Angels, said the Government’s "fantastic" Everyone In scheme helped to get a lot of people off the streets.

But she also said people who sleep rough are often dealing with other issues, such as addiction or mental health problems, and they need “ongoing support”.

She said: “It’s not just about rehousing them. A lot of them don’t have any life skills and can’t budget to pay the bills, so they end up wishing they were back on the streets or end up there again.

“They get the keys to the property that’s been stripped bare - it’s not a home. There’s also a community feel to the streets, they’ve got friends there.”

Shelter published the figures today after analysing statistics released by the Government and local authorities, but said some types of homelessness, such as sofa surfing, go entirely undocumented so true figures will be “much higher”.

The charity's analysis found more than 274,000 people are believed to be homeless on any given night, with 2,700 sleeping rough, nearly 15,000 single people in direct access hostels and nearly 250,000 in temporary accommodation.

Polly Neate, chief executive of Shelter, said: “We predicted the pandemic would trigger a rising tide of evictions and our services are starting to see the reality of this now.

“We’re flooded with calls from families and people of all ages who are homeless or on the verge of losing their home.”

The Government says tackling homelessness is an “absolute priority” and it has committed more than £2bn in funding over the next three years.