Ride out the Recession Alliance (RORA) is the latest push by The Big Issue (TBI) to get the government to address Covid-related homelessness and unemployment. It forms part of a wider campaign called ‘Today for Tomorrow’, which is linked to a Bill that is going before Parliament.
RORA is the ‘today’ element of the campaign, tackling the short term crises we are facing. And the Future Generations Bill is the ‘tomorrow’ – looking at the longer term impact of pandemics, climate change and poverty.
Between March, when the lockdown began, and September, the number of people claiming some level of unemployment benefit rose to 2.7 million. One of the hardest hit groups has been young people (under 25s), where the unemployment rate has risen to 13%.
TBI founder Lord John Bird introduced the Future Generations Bill in Parliament at the beginning of 2020. It has received cross-party support in the House of Lords and is due for a second reading in January 2021.
The Bill has been described as “central to how the country rebuilds following the coronavirus crisis”. Alex Phillips, campaigns manager at TBI, says: “We have an opportunity now with Covid to use as evidence that we need to think about tomorrow.”
We’ll explain more about the Bill later, but for now we want to know what help looks like for people in need and for those working in the sector. And is RORA on track to deliver this?
Homelessness and the rent crisis
The UK’s rent crisis has been well documented. One in eight private renters across England have fallen behind with their housing costs since the outbreak (according to the Resolution Foundation). Housing charity Shelter say that 174,000 private tenants have already been threatened with eviction by their landlord or letting agent. Local Housing Allowance only covers a fraction of people’s rents, and means many people who lost their job due to Covid are living in areas which are no longer affordable. Following a temporary ban on evictions, the courts reopened and are dealing with a backlog of the most serious cases.
As a result, homelessness has become a real fear for many. Looking longer term, almost half a million people in England are now at “high risk” of homelessness (according to the District Councils’ Network). It’s clear we haven’t seen the full effects of Covid on housing yet.
For those who were already homeless before the pandemic hit, things had seemed for once to be moving in the right direction. At the height of lockdown, the government issued an emergency £3.2bn grant for councils in England, and an extra £105m to keep rough sleepers off the streets. In April, under the government’s ‘Everybody In’ scheme, around 15,000 homeless people were moved into empty hotels and unused buildings across England.
At the time the scheme was widely praised by the sector, but six months later the number of people sleeping rough appears to be rising again. The latest figures show a 33% increase in the number of people sleeping on London’s streets between April and June this year.
Nik Browne, Service Manager at Reach Housing, is seeing the same thing happen in Bath: “[Everybody In] worked really well. The problem that followed was that once all the emergency accommodation had been used up there was nothing left for anybody new to the streets.” Nik’s team has noticed around 15-20 new rough sleepers in the area. Whether it’s due to relationships breaking down, sofa-surfers kicked out over fears of spreading the virus, or people being released from prison without a home to go to, the number of people on the streets is creeping back up.
The lack of any government direction or plan for ‘what next’ is causing bigger problems for the sector. In Bath, housing rough sleepers has had an impact on everyone else. “Of the 5,000 people in B&NES on the housing register, many will be looking for a one bed property. And there aren’t many available,” says Nik. Without sufficient move-on accommodation, it will be impossible to create the pathway from emergency to supported housing, and eventually independence and employment. “We need more social housing. It’s not a quick fix, but that is the blunt reality,” Nik adds.
So where does RORA come in?
The campaign has the backing of Shelter, Centrepoint and Generation Rent, amongst others. As well as supporting Shelter’s ongoing work around giving judges extra powers over evictions, RORA is calling for a rescue package that includes a new era of social homebuilding.
RORA has been meeting regularly with the Minister of State (Housing, Communities and Local Government), Christopher Pincher, to discuss other ways of making sure people don’t lose their homes. Ideas include boosting Universal Credit payments and Local Housing Allowance, and a ‘winter truce’ on evictions over Christmas.
One issue with building new homes is a lack of understanding of what is ‘affordable’. “People don’t understand that affordable housing means 80% of the average market rent,” says Nik. “That’s not affordable for lots of people. We need more social housing rents.”
Alex says that those in power are out of touch when it comes to housing: “If they [government] bit the bullet and paid people’s rent or mortgage, the knock on effect this would have on families would cost a lot less. Most people aren’t Rishi Sunak or Boris Johnson. They are out of touch.”
In a blog about RORA, Lord Bird wrote: “RORA needs to become the biggest pressure group imaginable. That it can gain supporters so that we can pressure the government into spending their money wisely and keep people in their homes.”
This is where the likes of Unilever, Nationwide and Deloitte come in. Large corporate companies have also joined the alliance to give it some extra clout in Parliament. “Government listens to them,” says Alex. “It’s a good opportunity for these businesses to change their image by creating new jobs and help to dismantle poverty.”
But will campaigns like RORA benefit people working in the sector? Well, yes if smaller organisations, like us at Clean Slate for example, can tap into it. Alex says this is what makes RORA unique – anybody can join and put their ideas across, including everyday members of the public. “I haven’t seen anything like this replicated elsewhere, it engages with civil society who are bringing their own ideas to the fore, it’s very grass roots.”
While the government’s allocation of funding for the homeless has been generous, particularly throughout the pandemic, one of the challenges faced by housing teams is inconsistency. “Much of our funding is year on year so we don’t know what we’re going to get. It makes it difficult to plan ahead and come up with a long term solution,” says Nik. It can also impact on staff retention. “It’s great pumping the money in but we need something more sustainable than this.”
The referral system is another obstacle to getting help to the people who need it most. In many parts of the UK people get referred to support services via the council. This process often involves lengthy and complicated form filling which can put many people off. Rather than tackling problems early, like debt for example, it is often too late by the time people are forced to access emergency support.
Sustainable employment
The second strand of RORA is to create sustainable, well paid jobs. The group is calling for government investment in training schemes especially for people who are out of work after furlough. Whether it’s in caring, distanced teaching and learning or renewable energies, there is a whole raft of sustainable jobs that we need now. “We’ve now got a real opportunity to try to get rid of job insecurity and people living on the margins,” says Alex.
Only time will tell whether the launch of schemes like JETS and Kickstart, which is aimed at 16-24 year olds, will be a success. During a recent webinar by the Learning and Work Institute, Sam Windett, director of policy at youth employment group, Impetus, spoke about the positives and negatives of the scheme. “If young people who would have got a job anyway end up on Kickstart, it won’t be value for money.” Sam also raised potential problems around work coaches adhering to eligibility criteria, a lack of quality jobs and not getting the right geographical match. “If there’s rubbish jobs, if young people don’t see any interest and get the right support alongside it, then there are big reputational issues.”
RORA is also pressing for more work to be done to protect industries like the arts, which do wonders for our mental health, and have suffered a major blow. “They need time to build a Covid-proof offer,” says Alex. “But they are sustainable and will come back at some point. France has helped its arts sector enormously and we haven’t. This is the kind of thinking we need.”
But is this going to get to the heart of the unemployment crisis? Nik says: “It’s fantastic for people who have just lost their jobs. But what about people who are further from the job market?”
Why now? The Future Generations Bill
As we said at the start, it’s not just the short term problems that need solving.
The Future Generations Bill is inspired by the existing Welsh act, which focuses on finding and implementing long term solutions to poverty, the effects of climate change and, more recently, global pandemics. If passed into law, it will mean that policy makers have to take the interests of future generations into account when it comes to decision making. There would also be a legal right for individuals to hold public bodies to account, and a specially appointed Commissioner to scrutinise decisions. Companies would be obliged to consider the impact of their work too.
Many MPs, including the Prime Minister, signed the pledge for the Bill at the end of 2019. “It’s not controversial, it’s just common sense. It’s difficult for any politician to disagree with it,” says Alex.
The impending Brexit deadline makes the Bill even more timely. “We are leaving Europe at the end of December with potentially no-deal – this will compound the Covid catastrophe,” says Alex. “We need thinking for the future, not just the present day.”
But will the government sit up and listen? “Over the next few months and years we will most likely see the government implementing the wrong policies and leaving people in an awful place,” Alex says. “It will come down to saving people’s lives.”
