Torfaen Council’s cabinet today agreed to fund a support service to help people who are homeless “get back on their feet” and into longer-term tenancies.
Pearl House, a Grade II listed building in Pontypool. is currently being converted into 15 flats by Melin Homes. The cabinet met to view a report and make a decision over spending £449,514 from the £4.6 million it receives Welsh Government’s housing support grant on a new ‘accommodation and assessment hub’ to help the people who will live there temporarily. The provider was not named in the report or during the public meeting.
Cllr David Daniels, executive member for adult services and housing, said: “This is good news in the midst of a worsening housing crisis quite frankly. It’s a more sustainable and more effective way of delivering housing.” He told the cabinet that staff would provide 24-hour support and added that this would mean it was “more likely” to help residents “get back on their feet and most to a position of sustainable tenancies.” Cllr Daniels said it was a chance to catch rough sleepers “who had been failed at various points in their life.”
Simon Rose, Torfaen Council’s housing and commissioning group manager, said the new flats with this on-site service would help “stop the revolving door of homelessness”. He said a new Torfaen Homeseeker policy was already helping to improve the number of “failed tenancies”. Across Torfaen, Mr Rose told councillors there were about 100 individuals being accommodated in various types of temporary accommodation including shared tenancies and homes of multiple occupancies, but as of “today” there were not any in hotels. He said the tenancies would be for up to six months but hoped the average stay would be around six weeks.
He explained that managing rough sleepers was complicated and some chose not to talk to the council or take up offers of support.
Cllr Sue Morgan, executive member for resources, said a service of this type “goes right to the heart of our agenda of governing with prevention” and would “alleviate pressure” on other services. She added that it was important the service providers shared “good monitoring data” to show the outcomes of the people that used the service so they could demonstrate “good value for money” to the Welsh Government.