Dom Pannell's Blog

Camden Borough Council disses Crisis Open Christmas

The document below, which details why Camden Borough Council is blocking Crisis's application to run a homeless centre on Euston Road during Christmas week, just came into my possession.

The document is in two parts: firstly Camden's response to the application by Crisis, which is the second part.

Scroll right down for my initial thoughts on their conclusions. Please feel free to comment.

BRIEFING ON THE PROPOSAL TO OPERATE A CHRISTMAS CENTRE
AT FORMER WELLCOME LIBRARY, 210 EUSTON ROAD

INTRODUCTION

The Crisis Open Christmas will this year be operating eight centres across London providing services and support to homeless and vulnerably housed people over the Christmas period. Centres will be running in Southwark, Whitechapel, Shepherds Bush, City Of London, Deptford and Kennington.

Crisis Open Christmas has been offered the use of the former Wellcome Library building in Euston Road to cater for people in the Northern fringe of inner London.

We have received a proposal from Crisis asking for our support for such a scheme.

Our response to the proposal is that we would be delighted for Crisis to come into Camden to help give homeless people using our existing hostels a better Christmas but could not support any additional capacity at Christmas or at any other time.

We currently support, with our partners, 1559 homeless households of which 583 are single homeless people (in all, some 4171 people). All of the single homeless people in Camden hostels are in our Pathways programme. That means we are planning with them from day one when they enter a hostel (regardless of who runs it) their future moves leading towards eventual independent living and finding work. We are also pursing a very careful and planned reduction in hostel numbers and reconfiguration and improvement of services. We would be very concerned therefore about any change to the homeless services in Camden that might put this work at risk and potentially hinder rather than help homeless people. It is for this reason that we are not supportive of the Crisis Open Christmas specific plans for the use of the site on the Euston Road.

Crisis is naturally disappointed about this. They are dependent on where they can get appropriate buildings to set their centres up and feel that wherever they set up the hostel they have a strong track record of working closely in partnership with other homelessness agencies, the council and others to deliver a service on behalf of homeless people in London, whilst adding to and not disrupting year-round provision.
With that in mind they have indicated to us that they will be raising the issue further with other parties connected to the London Borough of Camden in order to reach a satisfactory conclusion.
They were not specific about the latter but we assume they will enlist the help of the Wellcome Foundation, homeless charities in the borough. Elected members might also be approached. The press might be involved at some stage.

Michael Scorer, Assistant Chief Executive has already spoken at length to Lesley Morphy, Chief Executive at Crisis and he has also spoken to John Cooper, Director of Resources as the Wellcome Foundation who acknowledges the reasons why we cannot support the proposal.

Planners advise us that Crisis would need to submit an application for temporary planning permission and that unless the Council had a particular interest in expediting the process, an application submitted now would not be determined before Christmas.

THE OUTLINE PROPOSAL

The proposals submitted would be for the former Wellcome Library at 210 Euston Road to be open from 23rd to the 30th December. The venue would utilise all 4 floors and would cater for up to 250 people during the day with sleep over facilities for a smaller number (100). The following services would be provided during the day:

• HEALTHCARE including Medical centre, Dentistry, Chiropody, Opticians
• ADVICE, including Housing Advice, Legal advice, employment and training advice in partnership with London wide service providers, Borough housing officers, CAB, Refugee Council and others
• DEPENDENCY Working with Turning Point to provide counselling and access to longer term support programmes for people with dependency issues
• LEARNING AND SKILLS: ESOL, Literacy and Numeracy, Arts and Crafts, Lifeskills, Libraries
• ‘FEELGOOD’ SERVICES: Clothing, Hairdressing, Massage
• ENTERTAINMENTS & ACTIVITIES: including participative games such as bingo, visits to sports centres etc

The centre will also provide all clients with three nutritious meals every day.

Full details of the proposal are attached at annexe 1.

OUR CONCERNS ABOUT THE PROPOSAL

In April this year we launched our Pathways Model across all hostels, which was 3 years in the making and encourages a culture of recovery and move on. Officers have worked closely with existing hostel providers in the borough to ensure that their hostels are places of change but moreover the bedspaces across the hostel estate are of the right type to cater for the diversity of needs of the homeless population; from a rough sleeper with drug and alcohol problems to those approaching independence who simply require assistance around budgeting etc.

All hostels are now designed to meet specific needs and the old model of large generic schemes providing support to ‘random’ referrals has been swept away. Hostel providers in Camden receive funding (in the region of £20M pa) from the Council to provide support services in hostels, this is via the Supporting People Programme (a grant we receive from Central Government), and are contracted to provide a range of specific interventions and broader support.

Our concerns about the Crisis proposal are manifold.

1. We remain unconvinced that this type of service is necessary within our current model of service provision. Camden would be happy to welcome Crisis into existing hostels to provide extra support over Christmas. The majority of services offered in the Crisis proposal are part of mainstream provision. There is current capacity within Camden’s Hostels to meet presenting need.

2. KX is currently a very sensitive location, with the introduction of the channel tunnel link and a recent significant (if still currently very small) rise in incidents related to street activity. There is a partnership response in place to tackle this issue, but facilitating a week long unregulated service for 250 people we have no control over could potentially exacerbate this.

3. We have no way to monitor the quality of the service or advice offered by Crisis (unlike other hostel providers in the borough). Volunteers from LB Camden have raised concerns regarding the standard of housing and legal advice given at previous events.

4. The unconditional nature of the service (the centre would accept all comers) means that it could negatively cut across carefully planned tasking and targeting work that the police, outreach services, hostels and other agencies have been working to over the last year to assist street population and homeless groups.

5. A stand alone service is likely to import attendant street activity into the borough, which may remain after the project closes.

In short

• We think that this is the wrong type of provision in the wrong place.

• The model run by Crisis is old fashioned and harks back to the days when rough sleeping numbers were much higher.

• We do not accept that encouraging large numbers of vulnerable people to travel across London is beneficial or helpful.

• The services on offer at the centre are services that are on offer all year round and service users should be encouraged to access them where they live as these services are not just for 7 days of the year.

• There is existing capacity within the hostel system to meet presenting need.

Briefing provided by
XXXXX XXXXX
Acting Assistant Director (Needs and Access)
Housing and Adult Social Care
0207 XXX XXXX
XXXXX.XXXXX@camden.gov.uk

APPENDIX 1

Proposal for Camden

THE CENTRE

The former Wellcome Library at 210 Euston Road has been offered to us to use as one of the Eight Centres we are opening over Christmas this year from the 23rd to the 30th December. This is an excellent venue in terms of facilities and environment and we will be looking to utilise four floors of this building to provide the following services:

• HEALTHCARE including Medical centre, Dentistry, Chiropody, Opticians
• ADVICE, including Housing Advice, Legal advice, employment and training advice in partnership with London wide service providers, Borough housing officers, CAB, Refugee Council and others
• DEPENDENCY Working with Turning Point to provide counselling and access to longer term support programmes for people with dependency issues
• LEARNING AND SKILLS: ESOL, Literacy and Numeracy, Arts and Crafts, Lifeskills, Libraries
• ‘FEELGOOD’ SERVICES: Clothing, Hairdressing, Massage
• ENTERTAINMENTS & ACTIVITIES: including participative games such as bingo, visits to sports centres etc

The centre will also provide all clients with three nutritious meals every day and accommodation for those in most need.
The building has been offered for our use by the Wellcome Foundation, who have pledged their full support to the project. We also have the support of one of the key service providers in the area who see this as an enhancement of provision over the Christmas period.

HOW THE CENTRE WILL BE RUN

Each Crisis Open Christmas Centre is run by a team of experienced volunteers supported by the permanent Crisis staff team. Up to 50 volunteers will assist in the running of each shift at each centre every day.

In addition to this every service will be run by professionals in their sector and through partnerships with statutory and voluntary organisations.

SLEEPING

One of the key aims of smaller more accessible centres at the Crisis Open Christmas is to reduce the demand for sleeping over. This was not possible when we had a large Main Centre – often in a remote location. We will work to reduce the sleeping provision available at the Wellcome Centre. However although our long term aim is to phase out sleeping – this will take sometime to achieve and we feel we will have to provide some sleeping at the Wellcome building – especially as spatially it is one the more appropriate centres for this purpose.

Our current plans would be for the Wellcome Centre to be used by approximately 250 guests a day but with sleeping capacity for much fewer. If we were to operate a day centre only, we would potentially create an issue each evening when we close for those people who do not have somewhere to stay, and over Xmas itself, when public transport is closed. We believe that it is better to have some sleeping provision that then allows for us a more managed egress from the centre at the end of the Open Christmas without leaving a footprint.

We will take the following measures to reduce sleeping demand at the Wellcome Centre:

• Work with hostel providers to manage expectations of clients coming to the Open Christmas that there will be limited sleeping for those in priority need only and that they will be expected to return to their hostels
• Reduce sleeping capacity from projected 200 to approximately 100 to cater for those in most need or who would find it difficult to return to their hostels
• Advertise that the centre will have limited sleeping capacity and that those with bed spaces ( ie hostel tenants) will not be guaranteed a place to sleep

NEIGHBOURBOOD MANAGEMENT PLAN

The Crisis Open Christmas operates a Neighbourhood Management Plan for each of its centres that assesses risk and ensures that our presence in an area has minimal impact on local communities and traders. We also liaise closely with police and street outreach teams prior to and during the event to monitor and respond to client activity in the vicinity of a centre

CENTRE CLOSURE

The centre will close at 10am on the 30th December. There will then be a managed dispersal of clients with minibuses taking people out of the area and back to their area of residence. This will be accompanied by foot patrols by volunteers to ensure that the vicinity of the centre is cleared promptly and effectively.

This procedure has worked well in the past. For example in 2006 similar sized centres in Leadenhall and Middlesex St, E1, were vacated swiftly and with no legacy of clients remaining in the vicinity.

WORKING CLOSELY WITH CAMDEN

We believe Crisis Open Christmas continues to deliver a vital service over the Christmas period for homeless and vulnerably housed people in London. We are always dependent on where we can get appropriate buildings to set our centres up in, but wherever we get them we have a strong track record of working closely in partnership with other homelessness agencies, the council and others to deliver a service on behalf of homeless people in London, whilst adding to and not disrupting year-round provision.

In setting-up a centre in the Welcome building we are committed to working closely with the Borough of Camden and its Pathways partners to ensure that the Open Christmas integrates well into the Borough over the Christmas period. We already have volunteers from the Borough of Camden who work annually in our advice service but would welcome any additional presence at the Centre in Camden to promote Pathways or other appropriate services. We would of course also be willing to meet with the Providers Forum and other relevant agencies to discuss these matters.

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Boy, reading that document made my blood boil.

My initial twopenneth:

* We think that this is the wrong type of provision in the wrong place.
o So, does that mean there isn't any demand? If the past six years (I started volunteering for Crisis Open Christmas in 2001) are anything to go by, there is a risk that some of the shelters will need to close their doors before the end of the week because they will reach maximum capacity. Locations are chosen because a vacant building exists in London.
* The model run by Crisis is old fashioned and harks back to the days when rough sleeping numbers were much higher.
o The Crisis model has evolved even in the time that I have been involved - it is true that the number of rough sleepers has diminished, but there is a substantial number of 'sofa surfers' who are excluded from the system because they cannot give a permanent address, etc. I am most proud of the achievement that each year COC helps close to 100 people get onto housing lists. Prior to COC week, these people were pretty hopeless.
* We do not accept that encouraging large numbers of vulnerable people to travel across London is beneficial or helpful.
o Should people stay where they are and not have access to clean clothes, medical attention, advice on getting off drugs from qualified advisors, advice on accessing housing from qualified advisors, hot food, conversation, etc.? COC is a high point in the lives of some of London's most vulnerable people. Yes, they travel in to access services - otherwise they'd go without. At the end of the week, Crisis lays on buses to take guests to major transport hubs, effectively leaving the number of homeless in the area of COC centres the same as before.
* The services on offer at the centre are services that are on offer all year round and service users should be encouraged to access them where they live as these services are not just for 7 days of the year.
o Back to my first point. COC is a means of catching people who would otherwise miss out. Moreover, many hostels close down for Christmas week, so the alternative is a week on the street.
* There is existing capacity within the hostel system to meet presenting need.
o Back to my first point. If there was no demand, COC wouldn't exist. Even if Camden can guarantee that its hostels do not close for Christmas and that they have capacity for all demand (good luck!) it is not the case in neighbouring boroughs.

I would also add that COC is basically self-sufficient. The constraints on host councils are minimal and both Crisis the charity and its regular volunteers work to minimise the disruption to the local area. Crisis has a tremendous track record in leaving properties in the same condition as they were at the start of COC.

The jibe about the quality of housing advice is particularly galling - Crisis relies on independent housing advisors for the provision of such advice and has done for as long as I have been connected to the charity. COC has been around for over 20 years - maybe once upon a time that criticism was correct... and maybe once upon a time COC could have been called old fashioned...

Posted by dompannell at November 29, 2007 3:15 PM | TrackBack