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Contents
How this strategy aligns with other North Yorkshire strategies
The profile of North Yorkshire
Theme 1: Preventing homelessness
Priority 1: Intervening before people reach housing crisis
Priority 2: Improving the customer journey
Priority 3: Working with voluntary, community, and social enterprise sector to prevent homelessness
Theme 2: Increasing the availability of suitable accommodation options
Priority 1: Increasing access to suitable and affordable housing
Priority 2: Meeting the needs for and improving temporary accommodation
Priority 3: Increasing access to supported housing
Theme 3: Improving availability and access to support services
Priority 1: Strengthening housing related support pathways
Priority 2: Improving support for people facing multiple disadvantage
Priority 3: Embedding inclusive, trauma informed, and culturally competent practice
Priority 4: Supporting voluntary, community, and social enterprise engagement and peer-led models
Theme 4: Reducing rough sleeping
Priority 1: Meeting people experiencing rough sleepings accommodation and support needs
Priority 2: Supporting people experiencing rough sleeping with multiple and complex needs
Priority 3: Working with local business and the voluntary sector
Foreword from Cabinet member.
The North Yorkshire homelessness and rough sleeping strategy 2025 – 2030 sets the strategic direction for homelessness and rough sleeping services across North Yorkshire.
Our vision is of preventing homelessness and rough sleeping wherever possible and where homelessness cannot be prevented, to make it rare, brief, and non-recurrent. We intend to achieve this vision through working with our local statutory and voluntary and community partners, and to ensure good quality and stable temporary and long-term housing is available, with support in place where this is needed.
The strategy sets out the context for homelessness and rough sleeping in North Yorkshire and how the council and its partners will seek to meet the challenges it faces across four key themes. These themes are:
1. Preventing homelessness.
2. Increasing the availability of suitable accommodation options.
3. Increasing availability and access to support services.
4. Reducing rough sleeping.
The strategy will be delivered through a reducing homelessness action plan.
This is the first homelessness and rough sleeping strategy for the new unitary North Yorkshire Council. It outlines the council’s vision for preventing homelessness and rough sleeping across North Yorkshire, its priorities, and the actions it will take to achieve these priorities over the next five years.
The strategy has been developed in the context of recent and upcoming legal and regulatory changes. These include:
· The Supported Housing (Regulatory Oversight) Act 2023: This comes into effect in 2025/26. It aims to improve regulation of supported housing and improve the quality of supported exempt accommodation. The Act requires local authorities to review local supported housing against new national standards and to set up licensing schemes relating to local supported housing providers.
· The Renters Rights Bill: This seeks to end Section 21 “no fault” evictions, to remove fixed-term assured shorthold tenancies, and give tenants the power to challenge unreasonable rent increases and to apply the Decent Homes Standard to the private rented sector.
· The Domestic Abuse Act 2021: This creates a statutory definition of domestic abuse – covering emotional and economic, as well as physical abuse. Under the Act, all eligible victims of domestic abuse experiencing homelessness have an automatic priority need for homelessness assistance. Local authorities in England are now required to provide accommodation-based support to domestic abuse victims and their children, including in refuges and other safe accommodation. The Act also strengthens requirements for social tenants who have experienced domestic abuse to receive secure lifetime tenancies.
Other recent changes mean that people escaping domestic abuse, veterans, and care leavers no longer must demonstrate a local connection to the area in which they are seeking access to social housing. The closure of Home Office-funded accommodation for ex-asylum seekers and the Government’s early release prison scheme are both increasing demand on local authority homelessness services. The Government has recently announced a new cross-departmental homelessness task force and plans for a new approach which is more clearly focused on homelessness prevention.
The new strategy has been developed through review of available data relating to homelessness and rough sleeping in North Yorkshire, engagement with local stakeholders – including the council, statutory partners, housing, and other voluntary, community, and social enterprise services working with people experiencing homelessness and rough sleeping, and people using these services.
How this strategy aligns with other North Yorkshire strategies
The Housing Strategy 2024 – 2029 recognises the challenges brought about through increased demand for homelessness services and temporary accommodation, reduced supply of private and social rented accommodation (especially in rural areas), housing affordability, and demographic changes – including an ageing population and the emergence of new groups, such as asylum seekers and refugees.
The council aims to meet these challenges through a range of initiatives, including:
· Bringing together homelessness prevention and support services.
· Developing innovative and existing accommodation solutions, including for temporary and affordable family accommodation.
· Specialist housing for specific groups, such as older people and those with a health need or disability.
· Housing supply will be increased via delivering at least 800 affordable homes each year of the strategy – boosting council home stock, working with new partners such as the Ministry of Defence, and a new Empty Homes Strategy.
· The Council will also use its legal powers to enforce and raise standards in the private rented sector, including via selective licensing schemes.
The North Yorkshire Joint Local Health and Wellbeing Strategy 2023 – 2030 recognises the contributions of a wide range of local services to people’s health and wellbeing, including housing, social care, community safety, and leisure. The strategy highlights opportunities for joined up working offered by the introduction of integrated care boards, including across the NHS, local councils, and other partners and by integrated care systems, which can coordinate services and planning to improve population health and reduce inequalities between different groups. The strategy focuses on early intervention and prevention, using asset-based community development to support local solutions to improve health and wellbeing and addressing drivers of poorer health outcomes, such as transport, housing, and service access. There is also a focus on working with communities to develop collective understanding of and responsibility for actively managing health and wellbeing.
The proposed upcoming changes to the delivery of supported housing services is a new model for delivering short and long-term supported accommodation in North Yorkshire. It focuses on expanding and enhancing short-term accommodation and support, especially for people with complex needs. The strategy will support additional supported housing placements across North Yorkshire and meet a broader range of need. The model offers a flexible multi-faceted approach, which allows people to move between levels of support, according to their needs and life circumstances. It will strengthen joint work between housing, Adult Social Care, and mental health services, and duplication of interventions and work to a formalised multi-disciplinary team process, shared induction, and training for housing and Adult Social Care staff, and, in the longer-term, a single assessment system. The commissioning strategy will also link with other programmes, including mental health redesign, domestic abuse commissioning, and public health work around multiple disadvantage.
The Homelessness and Rough Sleeping Strategy also aligns with North Yorkshire strategies around climate change, economic growth, and current local plans.
North Yorkshire Housing Needs service participates in North Yorkshire Home Choice, the choice-based housing allocations scheme for the county. Home Choice involves local authority and housing association properties for rent across the North Yorkshire area. The council also sits on the North Yorkshire Home Choice project board.
Through its membership of the York and North Yorkshire Housing Partnership, the Housing Needs service is involved in boosting delivery of affordable homes, supporting economic development, and supporting strategic aims around healthy and thriving communities.
The North Yorkshire Homeless and Rough Sleeper Forum has been recently relaunched. Meetings in the East and West of the county look place in December 2024, attended by around 70 local services. The council also participates in:
· North Yorkshire Homeless Partnership Group.
· North Yorkshire, York, and Selby Homeless Network.
· The Domestic Abuse Partnership and Domestic Abuse Housing Alliance (DAHA) Strategic Project Board.
· Safeguarding Adults Board and Safeguarding Children’s Partnership.
· Multi Agency Child Exploitation (MACE).
· Multi-Agency Risk Assessment Conference (MARAC), Multi-Agency Tasking and Coordination (MATAC) and Multi-Agency Public Protection Arrangements (MAPPA).
· Drug and Alcohol Partnership Board.
Key challenges affecting North Yorkshire include:
· A severe shortage of affordable housing: This continues to limit our ability to prevent homelessness and rehouse people quickly. The stock of social housing remains below national average levels, house prices are high, and private rents continue to rise. Gaps between Local Housing Allowance (LHA) and market rents make it harder for low-income households to access or sustain tenancies. Reduced availability of private rented housing, including through conversions to holiday lets and second homes in some areas, is compounding these challenges and placing particular pressure on rural and coastal housing markets.
· Geographic inequalities and rurality: Create access challenges for many of our residents – North Yorkshire’s size, dispersed population, and localised housing markets mean that people’s access to housing and support varies depending on where they live. In rural areas, distance, limited public transport, and digital exclusion can delay or prevent engagement with services, particularly where provision is already stretched.
· Economic pressures and insecure employment: Increase homelessness risk. The cost of living crisis, low wages, and insecure work mean more households are struggling to afford housing costs, even where their needs are not complex. These pressures are reducing resilience and contributing to rising presentations, particularly among single adults and younger households.
· An ageing population: This is reshaping the pattern of housing-related support needs across North Yorkshire. One in four residents are already aged 65 or over, and this is expected to rise to one in three by 2035. Older people increasingly require housing that is accessible, affordable, and linked to care, support, or prevention services, including through home improvement, adaptations, and supported move-on options.
· Increasing complexity of need: Shapes who comes to us for support. There has been a rise in single people with support needs, including mental health, substance use, and involvement with the criminal justice system. More people are presenting in housing crisis, limiting the potential for early intervention and increasing demand for relief and temporary accommodation services.
· Pressure on move-on and supported accommodation: People are staying longer in temporary accommodation due to a shortage of suitable move-on options. Achieving successful outcomes in supported accommodation is becoming harder, with increasing levels of need, limited specialist provision, and reduced revenue funding.
· Inconsistent experiences of our services: Reflecting variation in how people access support and how it is coordinated across teams and services. While there are strong examples of good practice, access routes, commissioning structures, and data systems, these are not yet fully aligned, which can make joint planning and early intervention more difficult.
· Workforce confidence in trauma-informed practice: This remains uneven. Not all teams feel equipped to respond to people with complex needs or lived experiences of trauma, exclusion, or inequality. There is an ongoing need to embed consistent supervision, reflective practice, and joint training across housing, social care, and wider partnerships.
· Ongoing policy reform and national change: The context in which we operate is reshaping. We are adapting to new responsibilities under the Domestic Abuse Act, Renters’ Rights Bill, Supported Housing (Regulatory Oversight) Act, and changes to asylum accommodation and early release from prison. These reforms increase demand for housing and support services and require clear coordination across systems and sectors.
North Yorkshires opportunities and aspirations include:
· Strong leadership and unified structures: Will give us a solid foundation to drive change. There is strong political will and senior-level commitment to addressing homelessness and rough sleeping across the council. The creation of a new unitary authority brings the opportunity to simplify service access, strengthen internal collaboration, and develop consistent models of housing and support across the county.
· Improving the customer journey: This has been a strategic priority for North Yorkshire Council. We have invested in aligning access routes, standardising triage processes, and ensuring a more consistent offer across the former districts. These changes are already improving how people navigate homelessness services and access support. We now have an opportunity to build on this work, embedding a more person-centred approach across all localities and strengthening consistency in decision-making, communication, and outcomes.
· Digital transformation and data-led prevention: Strengthens how we work. A single IT system for homelessness, integrated benefits systems, and access to council-held data will enable earlier identification, improved triage, and targeted support. Alongside this, we have streamlined access points, aligned processes across former districts, and begun improving the customer journey. These changes are helping us shift from reactive to preventative practice, making it easier for people to navigate services and receive the right help at the right time.
· Stronger joint commissioning and shared approaches: We are expanding collaboration between housing needs, Adult Social Care, and public health. This includes co-location of services, joint investment in prevention, and the development of shared models of support for people with multiple and complex needs.
· Partnerships with the voluntary, community, and social enterprise sector: Through renewed homelessness forums, partnership groups and projects, and closer work with Community First Yorkshire and our localities team, we are building stronger links with community-based organisations. These partnerships help us reach residents earlier, especially in rural areas.
· Lived experience and peer-led approaches: There is clear interest across services in involving people with lived experience more meaningfully in the design and delivery of services. Harrogate’s Lived Experience Network offers a strong foundation to build from, and we are committed to developing this further through a county-wide forum and consistent co-production principles.
· Innovative models of housing and support: Projects such as Housing First, REACH, and our in-house temporary accommodation service demonstrate the benefits of flexible, trauma-informed, and person-centred approaches for people with complex needs. We aim to replicate and expand these where appropriate.
· A clear strategy for developing supported accommodation: The forthcoming changes to the delivery of supported housing services will deliver a flexible multi-faceted model with additional placements, improving support for people with a range of needs and reducing reliance on temporary accommodation.
· Sustainable investment in housing priorities: The 100% council tax premium on second homes is expected to generate over £10m per year to support affordable housing, temporary accommodation, and improvements to the private rented sector. This gives us the financial capacity to take forward long-term solutions.
The profile of North Yorkshire
· North Yorkshire is the largest county in England and Wales, at over 8,000 square kilometres.
· As of 2024, the population was approximately 620,000.
· North Yorkshire is a largely rural county, with a population density of only 77 people per square kilometre, much lower than the national average of 432 per square kilometre. Only two towns (Harrogate and Scarborough) have a population of over 50,000.
· North Yorkshire’s population has grown by 2.85% since 2011. Its population is ageing, with 25% of people now aged 65 or over.
· North Yorkshire is among the least deprived local authority areas in England, however, there are pockets of deprivation, particularly in Scarborough.[1]
· In 2024, the median salary in North Yorkshire was around £35,500 p.a. However, in some localities, median salaries are significantly below the national average of £26,000.
· Over 108,000 residents are limited by health and disability.[2]
· The average house price in 2024 was £284,000. The average rent is £730 per calendar month.
· 18.7% of people rent privately, but less than 12% of households live in social rented housing.
· There are at least 6,000 active applications on North Yorkshire Home Choice.
Theme 1: Preventing homelessness
Approaches to the council for homelessness assistance have fluctuated in recent years, peaking at the end of 2023/24, before falling back slightly. Approaches are consistently highest in Scarborough and Harrogate. We are seeing more single homeless people and more people declaring support needs and complex needs, such as including mental health, substance use, domestic abuse, and contact with the criminal justice system. Recently, more asylum seekers have been seeking support from the council, due to closure of Home Office hotels. We are also seeing more larger Afghan families who have ended their period of stay in Ministry of Defence (MOD) property and unaccompanied asylum seeking children (UASC), due to legislative changes around the National Transfer Scheme (NTS).
As of 2023/24, end of private rented tenancy remained the most common reason for households owed a homeless prevention duty, with friends/family no longer willing to accommodate being the most common reason for households owed the homeless relief duty. However, many people were at risk of homelessness following loss of domestic abuse or a social tenancy. In addition, more people are at risk of homelessness due to financial difficulties – around 30% of people seeking assistance from the council are in work. Some people lack independent living skills, especially care leavers and other homeless young people.
There has been an upward trend in main duty acceptances – from 121 in the last quarter of 2022/23 to 168 in the second quarter of 2024/25. At the start of 2022/23, just under half (47.8%) of households were owed a prevention duty. However, by the start of 2024/25, this proportion was just over a third (35.6%). The fact that many people approach the council when they are already in housing crisis is hampering the council’s ability to prevent, rather than relieve, homelessness and underlines the need for effective homelessness prevention interventions.
Priority 1: Intervening before people reach housing crisis
Our new Housing Needs service structure brings together the seven former North Yorkshire districts into four new localities (Hambleton and Richmond, Harrogate and Craven, Selby and Ryedale, and Scarborough). This structure enables us to develop services and partnerships to meet existing and emerging needs around homelessness.
We employ dedicated Homelessness Prevention, Temporary Accommodation and also Private Rented Sector Officers in Selby, Ryedale, and Harrogate. Through our Homelessness Prevention Toolkit, we offer rent bonds and rent in advance, support around arrears, mortgage payments, and domestic abuse, and referrals to specialist services inside and outside of the council. We support households to manage rent arrears, removal, and other housing costs via Discretionary Housing Payments (DHPs).
Our new county-wide homelessness standby service provides a route for all calls via a single customer services number. This enables checks to be completed on Adult Social Care and Children’s Services systems, giving housing needs standby officers all the information they need to make a homelessness decision. Additionally, we have unified our IT systems for homelessness and Home Choice, and our single housing benefits system is due to go live in 2025.
We will:
1. Expand the private rented sector officer role to all localities.
2. Develop our employment and training offer through collaborative work with DWP, BEAM, and other voluntary, community, and social enterprise organisations, which will source sustainable employment opportunities for vulnerable households.
3. Review existing pre-tenancy support and independent living skills support and seek to expand this across all localities and service users in temporary accommodation, hostels, and other homelessness projects.
4. Consider introducing youth and schools-based early intervention programmes.
5. Continue to develop our data systems and explore what additional use can be made of housing benefit, council tax, NHS, and other available data to identify households in financial stress and who are at future risk of homelessness.
6. Implement the new Homeless Prevention Toolkit for North Yorkshire and publish this together with the service available to provide advice and assistance at the earliest opportunity for the community
Priority 2: Improving the customer journey
There are currently variations between localities in how people can approach the council and access homelessness support. This includes information available around available housing options and support from the council and other services, being able to self-refer, and access online support and in-person appointments. This can make it difficult to access support early, especially for people in rural areas where public transport is limited or digital access is poor. Some council homelessness services are perceived by service users as being difficult to navigate.
North Yorkshire has a higher percentage of households referred via a duty to refer than the England average. We also operate a commitment to refer, giving housing associations and other organisations the opportunity to refer people at risk of homelessness. We are now able to accept online duty to refer referrals and more easily provide updates to referring organisations. However, use of duty to refer varies across referral organisations and not all staff are fully aware of the duty to refer process. However, the process of application and awards for DHP is recognised as not yet being consistent across North Yorkshire. Additionally, not all housing needs and Adult Social Care staff have a full mutual understanding of respective statutory frameworks and service offers. This can negatively impact on people’s experience of North Yorkshire services.
To meet these challenges, we will:
1. Develop a county-wide action plan to ensure a consistent customer journey for people receiving support from the Housing Needs service.
2. Ensure all our homelessness prevention offers, including debt management/income maximisation, DHP, and rent deposits/rent in advance are consistent across localities.
3. Ensure housing needs pages on the North Yorkshire Council website are kept up to date and contain all relevant information for people to apply for assistance and understand their likely entitlements to housing and support.
4. Deliver refresher duty to refer/commitment to refer and Homelessness Reduction Act (HRA) training to all relevant frontline staff. This will include sessions at upcoming meetings of the Homelessness Forums and the newly developed Registered Social Landlord Partnership.
5. Increase use of the ‘AI buddy’ to support frontline staff with information and guidance around housing, care, and mental health legislation.
Priority 3: Working with voluntary, community, and social enterprise sector to prevent homelessness
North Yorkshire’s voluntary, community, and social enterprise sector works closely with communities, meaning they are well-placed to understand local needs and how best to engage with people about the support the council can provide to help them avoid homelessness. Many of these organisations are based in areas of North Yorkshire where the council does not have a local office/presence. We already have effective partnerships with some providers, such as Citizens Advice. However, more work is needed to develop these partnerships and to build voluntary, community, and social enterprise organisations’ capacity to support the council’s agenda around homelessness prevention.
We will:
1. Work closely with North Yorkshire Council’s localities team and Community First Yorkshire, to identify needs of individual communities and to develop engagement strategies, to encourage earlier engagement with council services around housing needs. This will include:
1a. Providing funding for a dedicated role which would increase voluntary, community, and social enterprise capacity, build knowledge of the council’s service offer around homelessness, and promote joint working with the Housing Needs service.
1b. Increase council presence and visibility in community settings. This might include joint working between voluntary, community, and social enterprise organisations and the DWP, to provide a single access point for support which could also promote the council’s homelessness prevention offer.
2. Work with the recently re-launched homelessness forums for the East and West of North Yorkshire and the NY Homelessness and Rough sleeping partnership group to increase voluntary, community, and social enterprise organisations’ involvement in decisions around developing and delivering community-led solutions.
Theme 2: Increasing the availability of suitable accommodation options
We want everyone facing homelessness in North Yorkshire to have access to safe, suitable accommodation. This theme focuses on the availability, quality, and distribution of temporary, supported, and settled housing across the county. It includes our work to increase affordable housing, improve the use and supply of temporary accommodation, and strengthen supported housing models for people with different levels of need.
Priority 1: Increasing access to suitable and affordable housing
In March 2023, median house prices in North Yorkshire ranged between £195,000 in Scarborough to £323,000 in Harrogate. Almost 70% of households in North Yorkshire are in owner occupation. Social rented housing accounts for less than 12% of households and in Craven and Harrogate, this figure is less than 10%.
As of September 2024, the median salary in North Yorkshire was around £35,500 p.a. However, in some localities, median salaries are significantly below the national average of £26,000. Low wages exacerbate housing unaffordability, meaning that fewer local households can afford to purchase a home on the open market and are reliant on other forms of tenure. 18.7% of households in North Yorkshire rent privately. Median rents in North Yorkshire have increased significantly over recent years, and in 2024 the average rent was £730 per calendar month. There is a particular lack of affordable housing options in rural areas, especially for young people.
There is competition for private rented properties from professional households and Home Office contractors for asylum seeker accommodation. The stock of privately rented housing has reduced recently, as some landlords have exited the market due to anxieties around new legislation/regulation and increasing numbers or properties are used as second homes or holiday lets. In addition, some landlords are reluctant to let to homeless households. There are large shortfalls between Local Housing Allowance (LHA) rates and market rents. For a two-bed property these currently range from around £95 p.c.m in Scarborough, to around £120 p.c.m in Harrogate.[3] As rents increase, so do top ups required by councils to sustain tenancies and prevent homelessness. Together these factors are driving rent increases, with a disproportionate impact on vulnerable households and those on benefits.
Total active applications on North Yorkshire Home Choice have been at least 6,000 since the end of 2022/23, with highest demand in Harrogate and Scarborough. Approximately half of applicants’ self-report a support need, mainly around their mental health and/or mobility. Around 50% of applications in most localities relate to one-bed properties. Total social lettings are decreasing, in 2023/24, the total was 2,310 lettings – a 10% fall on the total for 2019. At the same time, some applicants have unrealistic expectations around available housing options and support and may not be aware of services in other parts of North Yorkshire which could support them.
There has been a significant increase in non-commissioned exempt accommodation in North Yorkshire in recent years. As of March 2025, there were 1,149 exempt accommodation claims across 918 properties in North Yorkshire. However, there is currently a lack of oversight and quality assurance in this type of accommodation.
To meet these challenges, we will:
1. Provide transparent information on housing availability and waiting times, relevant services, and support across in other parts of North Yorkshire, to help housing applicants make informed choices about where they would like to live.
2. Work to fully evidence homeless households’ accommodation and support needs. This will include exploring how we can make best use of existing data, from Home Choice, public health needs assessments of vulnerable populations, and DEFRA mapping data, to identify gaps in commissioned support services in rural areas and identify demand for property sizes.
3. Work with North Yorkshire and York Housing Partnership to encourage more registered providers to join Home Choice, thus increasing choice for applicants.
4. Increase access to privately rented accommodation through enhanced landlord liaison and relationship-building, financial incentives, and support for landlords and working through landlord forums.
5. Work to ensure we meet all expectations in the Supported Housing (Regulatory Oversight) Act. This will include reviewing local supported housing in line with a set of national standards and setting up licensing schemes for local supported housing providers, to ensure minimum quality standards.
6. Continue to utilise direct lets across all localities, by reinforcing the single offer policy to households experiencing homelessness and make it more consistently applied.
Priority 2: Meeting the needs for and improving temporary accommodation
The number of households in temporary accommodation is increasing, with demand being particularly strong in Scarborough and Harrogate. There are more people in temporary accommodation who have complex needs. Gross spend on temporary accommodation has grown rapidly in recent years, from just over £500,000 in 2019/20 to over £2.1m in 2022/23 – an increase of 400%. Hotel and B&B use is increasing, particularly in Scarborough, with more people are staying longer in temporary accommodation because of lack of access to suitable move-on accommodation. There are also concerns about the quality of some temporary accommodation.
We have recently completed a review around customers’ ability to manage a tenancy and accessing temporary accommodation - this has identified the need for closer joint working with Adult Social Care around people who may be eligible for Care Act support. The council currently has access to 169 purpose-built and converted temporary accommodation units, some of which it owns and manages. However, temporary accommodation provision is not evenly distributed across localities, and the physical quality of accommodation varies considerably.
The council has provided around 26 additional units to date, with an additional 28 in the pipeline. In addition to in house provision we will work closely with partner registered social landlords. The programme will initially involve partnership working with registered providers, with the council providing grant funding for property refurbishment, acquisition, and/or support services, in return for property nomination rights. In the longer-term, we will seek to provide all temporary accommodation through our own assets, as this is the most financially advantageous option for the council.
We will:
1. Audit the locations and physical standards of existing temporary accommodation.
2. Explore how we can utilise reserves from Homelessness Prevention Grant and other budgets to upgrade current temporary accommodation stock.
3. Ensure that temporary accommodation can support people with multiple and complex needs. We are currently reviewing support planning processes and will utilise fundings to develop our support model and to design suitable move-on pathways. This will include input from Adult Social Care, substance use, and other relevant services to ensure appropriate care and support is given
4. Offer training to frontline staff around supporting people with multiple and complex needs.
5. Completion of the temporary accommodation development programme for additional units through in- house provision and working with Registered social landlords across North Yorkshire.
Priority 3: Increasing access to supported housing
North Yorkshire Council already provides supported housing for homeless and other vulnerable single people, to build independence and tenancy management skills. There are currently 131 short-term units, providing up to two years’ support for people with mental health, substance use, and offending needs,[4] and specialist support for people with complex needs, including our REACH service in Scarborough. We also provide 84 units of floating support. Long-term supported accommodation is available who are eligible for support under the Care Act. We have a Young Person’s Pathway Partnership between Housing and Children’s and Young people’s service which offers 174 units across all localities and provides up to two years of supported accommodation for young people aged 16 to 25 years, including care leavers, at risk of homelessness. Despite these resources, it is becoming harder to achieve successful supported accommodation outcomes – due to the increasing complexity of service users’ needs, and lack of specialist accommodation for some groups.
To meet this challenge, we will develop a new commissioning approach for supported housing. This will provide additional supported housing placements across North Yorkshire. The new model will support people with low, medium, and high needs and flex to people’s changing needs and life circumstances. The strategy will be supported by second homes council tax funding. The strategy will include investment for a 20-bed ‘Place of Change’ project for people with multiple and complex needs. The model for the project will draw on learning from Fern House in Harrogate. Options will include leasing the building to a registered provider, using rental income to generate revenue savings or recycle funds to support further initiatives.
The new strategy will provide a pathway for care leavers, people in the Young Persons Pathway (YPP), and temporary accommodation – thus supporting Adult Social Care and mental health services and reducing demand for temporary accommodation and other support. It will also help to reduce duplication of interventions and “shunting” of service users between housing and Adult Social Care. Through the new strategy, we will also support people to access employment and skills training, social, tenancy, and independent living skills training and support.
We will:
1. Develop an integrated access point between council directorates, to remove multiple access routes across housing and Adult Social Care and increase focus on achieving positive outcomes for individuals.
2. Explore scope for joint working with public health around multiple disadvantage (MEAM), to support people with a defined housing need, alongside wider care and support needs.
3. Strengthen the alignment of Young Person’s Pathway with wider supported housing models. Further detail on how the Young Person’s Pathway functions as a support pathway is provided in Theme 3.
4. Develop a Supported Housing Project in partnership with Health and Adult Services to provide up to 20 bedspaces.
Theme 3: Improving availability and access to support services
People experiencing homelessness in North Yorkshire often face challenges in accessing the right support at the right time. Too many only encounter our services in crisis, when opportunities for prevention have passed. Services and support pathways vary across the county, and those with overlapping needs, such as poor mental health, trauma, substance use, or contact with the criminal justice system, are not always well served by traditional models. In this theme, we set out how we will strengthen the system of support that surrounds housing, with a focus on inclusive, trauma-informed, and multi-agency approaches that respond more effectively to people’s circumstances.
Priority 1: Strengthening housing related support pathways
We provide a range of housing-related support pathways, but people’s experiences of these can vary. The Young People’s Pathway and our domestic abuse offer are well-established, but other areas, such as hospital discharge, are less consistent, and some groups, including women with complex needs, currently lack a clear pathway.
Young People’s Pathway and care leavers
The Young People’s Pathway is a widely used and nationally recognised model for supporting young people at risk of homelessness, including care leavers and 16/17 year olds. It is delivered in partnership with commissioned providers and supported by integrated working between housing and Children’s Services. In most areas, young people receive tailored, wraparound support, including key working, life skills, and links to education, training, or employment.
Stakeholders have highlighted several strengths, including more consistent referral pathways since the move to a unitary authority and the integration of young people’s homelessness prevention workers into housing options teams. These changes are improving continuity of support and case coordination. However, some gaps remain. Move-on options can be limited, particularly for care leavers and young people ready to live more independently. In some areas, there are fewer opportunities for engagement or meaningful activity, and limited input from mental health services. There is currently no formal housing protocol with Adult Social Care to support care leavers transitioning from supported accommodation, which is a significant gap in ensuring smooth and sustainable move-on.
The pathway is currently being recommissioned, with a new contract due in 2026. This offers a clear opportunity to build on the pathway’s strengths while addressing the specific needs of care leavers, aligning the offer with the new tiered supported housing model, and embedding trauma-informed, non-transactional approaches that reflect young people’s diverse experiences and aspirations.
Domestic abuse housing and support pathway
North Yorkshire has a strong domestic abuse housing offer. We provide dispersed safe accommodation across rural and urban areas, including refuge spaces, dispersed units, and hosting schemes. This is supported by a county-wide referral and assessment hub delivered by Independent Domestic Abuse Services (IDAS), and underpinned by inclusive, trauma-informed practice. The service is widely recognised for its innovation and accessibility. It supports people with no recourse to public funds, larger families, men, and LGBTQ+ survivors. Staff are supported through training aligned to Domestic Abuse Housing Alliance (DAHA) principles and a Champions Network.
However, there are areas to strengthen. We currently lack a clearly defined pathway for women with complex needs or those at risk of violence against women and girls (VAWG). Referral numbers from military families remain low, despite outreach and awareness-raising work. We will continue to strengthen our domestic abuse offer by reviewing gaps in provision, embedding good practice through DAHA training, and developing clearer support routes for under-served groups.
Armed
forces
Veterans experiencing homelessness may face multiple barriers
linked to trauma, mental health, substance use and difficulties
transitioning to civilian life. While military service does not
directly cause homelessness, it can increase vulnerability through
factors such as mobility, combat exposure or lack of stable support
on leaving accommodation. North Yorkshire’s housing
allocations policy includes specific provisions for armed forces
personnel, including exemption from local connection criteria,
disregarding compensation lump sums from income thresholds, and
additional preference for those in urgent housing need. The Council
has also agreed that bids will not be overlooked due to arrears
linked to service-related mesne profit accounts. An Armed Forces
Audit is currently underway to assess and improve the
Council’s wider offer to the armed forces community, and to
inform the development of a new Armed Forces Guide.
Hospital discharge
Hospital discharge arrangements vary across the county. Some localities, such as Selby, have established regular multi-disciplinary team meetings involving housing and health partners, enabling well-planned discharges and reduced delays. In other areas, there is less consistency. Stakeholders report issues such as Friday discharges, out-of-area placements, and limited involvement of housing in discharge planning. These gaps increase the risk of housing instability and homelessness for people leaving hospital, particularly those with high needs. We will work with A&E departments, hospital wards, and Integrated Care Board (ICB) partners to develop consistent, multi-agency discharge protocols and ensure earlier planning and better transitions into housing and support.
We will:
1. Strengthen the Young People’s Pathway (YPP) through the current recommissioning process, ensuring dedicated support for homeless 16/17-year-olds and care leavers, preventing homelessness for young people, clearer transition points, and improved move-on into training, employment, and settled housing.
2. Co-produce a Care Leaver Housing Protocol with leaving care services and other partners to support young people transitioning from care or supported accommodation.
3. Ensure the domestic abuse pathway remains inclusive and trauma-informed, while reviewing gaps in provision for women with complex needs, including those at risk of violence against women and girls (VAWG).
4. Work with health and hospital teams to improve discharge pathways, with a focus on earlier planning, reducing out-of-area discharges, and expanding good practice from Selby.
5. Develop multi-agency planning and support arrangements between housing, A&E services, and hospital ward staff to ensure safe discharge and reduce the risk of homelessness.
6. Promote consistent support offers across localities, including access to the same models and standards of pathway-based support regardless of where people live.
7. Engage with the findings of the Armed Forces Audit to strengthen our housing and homelessness offer for veterans, including through clearer referral routes, improved awareness among staff, and the development of an Armed Forces Housing Guide.
Priority 2: Improving support for people facing multiple disadvantage
We know that people experiencing multiple disadvantage, such as homelessness alongside mental ill health, substance use, trauma, or contact with the criminal justice system, often struggle to access coordinated support. People can fall between service thresholds, experience repeat homelessness, or cycle in and out of crisis. Many are well known to services but continue to face gaps in care.
We are already delivering some promising models. Our REACH project in Scarborough brings together a multi-agency team offering intensive, trauma-informed support. It takes a housing-led approach and moves away from traditional, appointment-based services – helping people address underlying issues such as mental health, substance use, and isolation. The team includes housing staff, a mental health nurse, a dual diagnosis worker, a clinical psychologist, domestic abuse worker, and holistic support workers, seconded or employed by partners including Tees, Esk, and Wear Valleys NHS Trust, IDAS, Horizons, and Beyond Housing. In Harrogate, the SAFE service provides a similar model for adults over 25. Both services show how partnership, shared risk and strengths-based approaches can engage people who are often excluded from mainstream systems. We are committed to expanding these models across the county. We are also embedding the national Making Every Adult Matter (MEAM) approach through our Multiple Disadvantage Network. This includes co-located teams, a strategic coordinator, and formalised protocols based on delegated authority and shared planning. A pilot in Harrogate hopes to reduce pressure on crisis services and enable more joined-up responses.
We recognise that access to mental health and substance use services remains a challenge, particularly for people with dual diagnosis. Fragmented systems and unaligned thresholds also present barriers to early intervention. Work is underway to implement an integrated system for supported housing clients, linked to the new three-tier model of accommodation. This will be supported by shared protocols, data sharing, and delegated authority. Housing and Care Practice Support Meetings, involving housing, Adult Social Care, mental health, and other partners, will coordinate planning, manage transitions between tiers, and help ensure that support is flexible, personalised, and responsive to changing needs. Temporary accommodation also plays a growing role in our support system. Not all temporary accommodation settings are yet designed to support recovery, and we are working with Adult Social Care, public health, and partners to strengthen support planning and pathways out of temporary accommodation for people with complex needs, and to ensure the support model is aligned with our wider case management and housing-led response.
We will:
1. Expand learning from the REACH and SAFE models across other parts of North Yorkshire, including their approaches to housing stability, trauma-informed practice, and integrated, multi-agency working.
2. Continue to embed the Making Every Adult Matter (MEAM) approach through the North Yorkshire Multiple Disadvantage Network, supporting co-located teams, shared risk planning and delegated decision-making.
3. Formalise and extend multi-disciplinary team working across localities, building on current practice in Scarborough and Selby.
4. Support the development of a fully integrated system for clients using Tier 2 and Tier 3 services, aligned to the new supported housing model.
5. Develop a longer-term ambition for a single assessment process to reduce duplication and improve client experience.
6. Strengthen joint working with mental health and substance use services, particularly to support people with dual diagnosis or inconsistent engagement.
7. Explore opportunities for joint commissioning and shared accountability between housing, Adult Social Care, and health services for people with multiple and complex needs.
8. Deliver joint training for housing and Adult Social Care staff on legal frameworks, responsibilities, and thresholds to improve support planning and coordination in complex cases.
9. Establish joint housing protocols with probation and youth justice services to support people leaving institutions and reduce repeat homelessness.
10. Develop clear pathways out of temporary accommodation for people with multiple and complex needs, to support sustained recovery and reduce repeat homelessness.
Priority 3: Embedding inclusive, trauma informed, and culturally competent practice
We are committed to embedding trauma-informed, psychologically informed, and culturally competent approaches across all homelessness services. We recognise that people’s experiences of trauma, identity, exclusion, and discrimination shape how they engage with support, and how support needs to be delivered. We are already building on strong foundations. Our Domestic Abuse Housing Alliance (DAHA) learning and development programme, the strengths-based approaches in REACH and SAFE, and reflective practice within our Housing Options teams are helping to shape more inclusive and psychologically aware ways of working.
However, we also know that practice remains inconsistent. Not all staff feel confident in applying trauma-informed approaches in day-to-day work, and some accommodation settings, particularly shared or emergency provision, are not always designed to promote safety and recovery. People accessing services in crisis may also struggle to understand complex systems or navigate administrative processes, particularly when support is not tailored to their circumstances. We recognise the need for a more consistent understanding of trauma-informed and psychologically informed practice across teams. By improving shared language and approaches between housing, Adult Social Care, and voluntary, community, and social enterprise partners, we can create more responsive, inclusive systems of support. We are committed to strengthening supervision, joint training and reflective spaces as part of this.
We will:
1. Continue to roll out training on trauma-informed and psychologically informed practice across housing and homelessness services
2. Develop a shared understanding of trauma-informed and psychologically informed approaches across Housing, Adult Social Care and voluntary sector partners, including through joint training and reflective spaces
3. Support staff through supervision to build confidence and consistency in working with people affected by trauma, exclusion, or systemic inequality
4. Work with accommodation providers to ensure environments support recovery and inclusion, particularly for people with mental health needs or those who have experienced trauma
5. Improve access to culturally competent and identity-aware services, particularly in rural areas and for people with communication or accessibility needs
6. Review service policies and processes to ensure they are inclusive and culturally competent, and co-designed where possible
7. Explore how we can better capture and act on feedback from service users from diverse backgrounds, as part of improving service quality and inclusion.
Priority 4: Supporting voluntary, community, and social enterprise engagement and peer-led models
Voluntary, community and social enterprise partners play a vital role in early intervention and specialist support, especially in rural areas where statutory services may be less visible. While we have relaunched Homelessness Forums across the county, we know more is needed to embed meaningful involvement of voluntary, community, and social enterprise organisations in strategy, service design and delivery.
This also applies to people with lived experience. We have heard clearly that individuals with direct experience of homelessness want to be involved in shaping services. Harrogate’s Lived Experience Network is already demonstrating the value of peer-led approaches, and we are committed to expanding this work across the county. Through the Multiple Disadvantage Network, we will support the development of a lived and living experience reference group to inform service design, commissioning and implementation. This will help make co-production a standard feature of our housing and homelessness services.
We will:
1. Strengthen the long-term role of voluntary, community, and social enterprise partners in delivering homelessness support, including through improved commissioning opportunities, funding partnerships, and involvement in strategic planning.
2. Support voluntary, community, and social enterprise capacity to deliver outreach and tenancy sustainment support, particularly in rural and underserved areas.
3. Expand Homelessness Forums as vehicles for shared planning and communication.
4. Establish a county-wide lived experience forum, building on good practice such as the Lived Experience Network in Harrogate, and develop principles and structures to ensure it is inclusive, resourced, and embedded in decision-making.
5. Pilot peer-led models of mentoring, advocacy, and navigation support.
Theme 4: Reducing rough sleeping
The number of people sleeping rough in North Yorkshire is increasing. In 2024, North Yorkshire’s annual street count found 34 people sleeping rough on a single night – a significant increase on the corresponding figure in 2023 of 14 people. Monthly figures for December 2024 show there were seven people sleeping rough over the course of a month who were new to rough sleeping. This compares to nine people in December 2023. There is also a wider group, estimated at around 100 people, who are at risk of rough sleeping in North Yorkshire. This group includes sofa surfers, people sleeping in cars, people at risk of losing their first accommodation placements, and those at risk of repeat homelessness.
Most people experiencing rough sleeping in the annual street counts were male, aged 26 or over, and UK nationals. There has been a recent increase in rough sleeping amongst women and couples over 30. All North Yorkshire’s localities have people experiencing entrenched rough sleeping, and people experiencing rough sleeping with multiple and complex needs, including around substance use, physical health, mental health, and offending. Rough sleeping in North Yorkshire is linked to loss of employment, substance use, and relationship breakdown. We know a small number of people come onto the streets each month after leaving prison or other institution.
Some people experiencing rough sleeping are not able to re-access accommodation because of previous challenging behaviour and/or perceived risks to themselves or others. Some people do not engage well with homelessness support because of previous negative experiences of services. Others are transient, moving between North Yorkshire localities or other local authority areas. There is migration to our coastal areas to sleep rough, especially during the summer months. This includes some people who are known to have tenancies in other areas. This transience is also linked to inconsistent service engagement.
Priority 1: Meeting people experiencing rough sleepings accommodation and support needs
Our new county-wide rough sleeper team brings together all staff and funding from the previous locality-based services. In addition, our Scarborough rough sleeper team is co-located with partner agencies. The new team structure and staffing help us better meet local demand and enable people experiencing rough sleeping who have exhausted all accommodation and/or support options in one locality to access support in another area. We carry out outreach shifts at least once each week in all localities. Outreach shifts are multi-disciplinary, including police and staff from Horizons, our commissioned substance use service.
People experiencing rough sleepings high degree of transience and often sporadic engagement with services, combined with North Yorkshire’s large geography and rurality, means it is difficult to reach all people experiencing rough sleeping and to build trusting relationships with individuals, especially those who are entrenched in their rough sleeping and/or who have complex needs. We provide emergency accommodation for rough sleepers via Selby Sleepsafe and the No Second Night Out (NSNO) service in Harrogate. NSNO offers emergency accommodation, person-centred support, and move on into appropriate housing and support, and has reduced rough sleeper numbers in Harrogate and short-term B&B use. However, we do not currently have emergency accommodation for rough sleepers in all localities.
We will:
1. Continue to develop resource-sharing across localities, to maximise opportunities for people experiencing rough sleeping to access housing and support opportunities across North Yorkshire.
2. Continue to work with police and other partners to share intelligence around rough sleeping.
3. Explore the need for additional outreach resources to work with people experiencing entrenched rough sleeping, and those experiencing rough sleeping with multiple and complex needs.
4. Seek to develop a consistent emergency accommodation offer for people experiencing rough sleeping, based on the NSNO model. We will work in partnership with North Yorkshire Council colleagues, B&B providers, and other private landlords to identify suitable buildings which could be procured or adapted for this purpose.
5. Review our approach to reconnecting people experiencing rough sleeping to their local authority area of origin, with a view to making this more robust.
6. Provide support to people experiencing rough sleeping with multiple needs in temporary and supported accommodation via the new Multiple Disadvantage Team.
Priority 2: Supporting people experiencing rough sleeping with multiple and complex needs
Our Harrogate SAFE (Services for Adults Facing Exclusion) and Scarborough REACH (Reducing Exclusion for Adults with Complex Needs) projects work with people experiencing entrenched rough sleeping. REACH was recently externally evaluated, and this work produced some valuable learning about how the project can be developed in future to support rough sleepers with multiple needs. Our Housing First scheme in Scarborough and Harrogate provides 16 units of accommodation for people with a history of rough sleeping and has been very successful in supporting people to maintain these tenancies.
We hold regular locality-based casework meetings. In Scarborough this includes fortnightly multi-agency tasking meetings and weekly multi-disciplinary team meeting, involving Adult Social Care, Horizons, and a local GP. At present, some high-risk people experiencing rough sleeping are not routinely identified via local tasking groups and data collection systems. Not all frontline staff are confident in working with people experiencing rough sleeping with multiple needs.
We will:
1. Expand the Housing First scheme across localities – utilising North Yorkshire Council stock and seeking agreement with registered providers around offering up additional units of accommodation.
2. Consider how to implement learning from the evaluation of REACH. This will include clarifying principles and protocols, to ensure consistent support and buy-in from partners; extending support outside of Monday – Friday office hours; ensuring that support continues beyond the end of a tenancy and where sideways moves are made; and sourcing additional safe and suitable housing, in order to expand the scheme.
3. Seek to make data recording around rough sleeping more consistent – adding rough sleeping data to our existing casework management system or developing bespoke IT solutions.
4. Develop a move-on pathway for entrenched people experiencing rough sleeping, including people with complex needs and/or a dual diagnosis.
5. Develop multi-disciplinary teams to deliver holistic support for people experiencing rough sleeping. These teams would be co-located and be likely to include substance use, dual diagnosis, IDAS, and housing support staff.
6. Ensure that training in psychologically-informed practice is available for staff in all services working with people experiencing rough sleeping.
Priority 3: Working with local business and the voluntary sector
There are well-established day services in North Yorkshire. These include the Rainbow Centre in Scarborough, Springboard in Harrogate, and Project 6 in Craven. The St. Giles outreach service operates from a camper van, covering rural areas in Ryedale. St. Giles offers advice, guidance, and referrals to other services. The model has been successful in engaging with vulnerable women and there are plans to start a second van service in the Skipton/Craven area. There are opportunities to strengthen collaborative working with these services and to extend the reach of outreach services.
Harrogate StreetAid enables the public to make small donations via a card terminal. Local homelessness organisations bid for this money, which is then donated to individual service users. To date, donations have funded health and wellbeing-related purchases – including bikes, driving lessons, and gaming consoles. As well as generating additional funding for people experiencing rough sleeping, StreetAid works to combat the perception of increased begging in Harrogate town centre and educates the council’s partners and communities on the difference between begging and rough sleeping.
We will:
1. Explore how outreach services could be delivered in partnership with day services.
2. Consider the benefits of commissioning a “welfare bus” to engage with people experiencing rough sleeping in rural areas, which offers support around housing, substance use, mental health, and welfare benefits.
3.
Develop the StreetAid offer to support
engagement with people experiencing rough sleeping and others
engaged in street activity.
About Homeless Link
Homeless Link is the national membership charity for organisations working with people experiencing or at risk of homelessness In England. We aim to develop, inspire, support, and sustain a movement of organisations working together to achieve positive futures for people who are homeless or vulnerably housed.
Representing over 900 organisations across England, we are in a unique position to see both the scale and nature of the tragedy of homelessness. We see the data gaps; the national policy barriers; the constraints of both funding and expertise; the system blocks and attitudinal obstacles. But crucially, we also see – and are instrumental in developing – the positive practice and ‘what works’ solutions.
As an organisation we believe that things can and should be better: not because we are naïve or cut off from reality, but because we have seen and experienced radical positive change in the way systems and services are delivered – and that gives us hope for a different future.
We support our members through research, guidance, and learning, and to promote policy change that will ensure everyone has a place to call home and the support they need to keep it.
What We Do
Homeless Link is the national membership charity for frontline homelessness services. We work to improve services through research, guidance and learning, and campaign for policy change that will ensure everyone has a place to call home and the support they need to keep it.
Homeless Link
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@HomelessLink
