What’s driving the rise in homelessness and what can the EU do about it?

euronews (in English)

The number of homeless people in the EU has doubled since 2009, with approximately 895,000 people sleeping on the streets or in emergency accommodations and shelters every night. This figure is equivalent to the population of Turin or Marseille.

Transcript

00:00 There is at least 890,000 people living on the street or in a homeless shelter

00:05 on any given night in the European Union.

00:08 When you're homeless, it's very difficult to integrate in society.

00:17 Most homeless people are in poor health,

00:20 but it also jeopardizes the chances for reintegration.

00:22 It's very difficult to find a job.

00:24 You become disconnected, really disconnected from society.

00:29 Homelessness is a broader concept than many people believe.

00:32 It's not just people sleeping on the street.

00:34 It's also people staying in homeless shelters,

00:37 short-stage shelter or long-stage shelter,

00:39 but also people that are forced to sleep with family and friends,

00:42 sofa surfers because of lack of housing of their own,

00:45 as well as people about to be released from institutions

00:48 like prison or psychiatric care and who have no place to go to.

00:52 The most important factors are the dysfunctional housing markets

00:58 that don't produce enough affordable housing,

01:01 the migration crisis, the influx of migrants and the flaws in migration policy,

01:05 the cost of living crisis, obviously,

01:08 and then you have other factors like drug addiction, family breakup, etc.

01:13 What happens in the traditional approach to homelessness

01:19 is that we try to treat and solve all the problems that homeless people might have

01:23 in the shelter system, and then at the end, we provide them housing.

01:27 Housing First actually puts that upside down

01:30 because it uses housing as a tool for integration

01:33 rather than as a reward at the end of an integration process.

01:36 Immediately, we use the stability that housing provides

01:39 to deal with all the other problems, and that turns out to be extremely effective.

01:43 What they do well is that they have a long-term approach to homelessness.

01:50 The objective of that strategy is to end homelessness, to do it gradually,

01:55 and the strategies are housing-led with a strong place for Housing First.

01:58 And there is sufficient money put towards it to make it actually work.

02:02 If you focus on rough sleeping, it's definitely achievable.

02:09 We can just learn from what happened during the COVID period.

02:12 The speed at which rough sleepers were taken off the street,

02:16 into shelter or other forms of accommodation was quite incredible.

02:19 I think we can repeat that and make that sustainable by 2030.

02:22 (upbeat music)

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