Prince William’s five-year programme to demonstrate that together it is possible to end homelessness is today marking a year of progress across its six locations, including Aberdeen.
Over the past year, Homewards has been working with Aberdeen, as well as the programme’s five other locations (Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole; Lambeth; Newport; Northern Ireland and Sheffield) to form coalitions which will drive the project forward locally and build action plans to put each location on a trajectory to end homelessness.
In Aberdeen, substantial work has taken place to identify emerging priorities vital to ending local homelessness and to lay the foundations, setting the area up for success by:
Forming a strong local coalition:
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- The Homewards Aberdeen Coalition consists of 55 organisations and individuals, working together to find solutions to homelessness.
- Members include Aberdeen City Council and other public sector organisations, local housing associations, third sector and faith networks and Aberdeen Football Club Community Trust.
- Homewards Advocate and social entrepreneur David Duke MBE is playing a key role as part of the coalition’s leadership group.
Identifying emerging focus areas:
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- Aberdeen will focus on using data to help understand and tackle the challenges of homelessness caused by relationship breakdown and youth homelessness.
- Street homelessness is low locally – however hidden homelessness is an issue, with high numbers of people in temporary accommodation, sofa-surfing and in insecure housing because of relationship breakdowns, including domestic abuse.
- Each location is also developing an Innovative Housing Project which will test new ways to unlock homes at scale for those who already experience, or who are on the brink of experiencing homelessness. The Innovative Housing Project in Aberdeen will support single adults who have experienced a relationship breakdown by bringing empty homes back into use.
Securing unprecedented partnerships:
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- Through Homewards, Aberdeen will work with The Salvation Army in Finland to learn about their approach to homelessness prevention.
- In exchange, Aberdeen will share its cutting-edge work on empty homes and some of the initial progress around data and research with the National Institute of Health Research.
Generating systems change:
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- Homelessness is part of Aberdeen City Council’s Local Outcome Improvement Plan, for the first time.
- Aberdeen is keen to focus on increasing the understanding of and changing perceptions locally around homelessness. Questions on homelessness were included in the May 2024 city-wide Citizens Panel survey that goes out to at least 800+ residents. This was co-developed by the Homewards and The Royal Foundation evaluation team. The results from the survey will be used to inform a strategy to change the narrative locally.
Working to change the narrative:
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- Across all six locations, Homewards is focused on improving understanding about the different forms of homelessness, shifting perceptions and boosting optimism that homelessness can be ended. Communications professionals are working collaboratively across all six locations on a strategy to reframe damaging negative perceptions of homelessness.
- Homewards will soon launch an exhibition with the Saatchi Gallery, which will include pieces created by children and young people at a series of creative workshops held across the six flagship Homewards locations, including Aberdeen.
- Homewards’ six flagship locations will also feature in an exclusive two-part ITV documentary series which explores homelessness in the UK today and follows the first year of the Homewards programme.
“Over the last year we have been working in partnership with six locations across the UK, bringing people and organisations together to create the foundations on which to build long-term change. Inspired by our belief that is possible to end homelessness, we are already demonstrating what can be achieved if we all work together. We are immensely grateful to the committed people, organisations and businesses who are working with us to prove homelessness can be prevented and solutions found.”
-Amanda Berry OBE, CEO, The Royal Foundation
As the programme moves into its second year, the Homewards Coalition in Aberdeen will focus on turning collaboration into action, as they publish and begin delivering their action plans to show that it is possible to end homelessness.
To mark the first year of progress, Prince William is today attending a special Homewards event in Lambeth, one of the six flagship Homewards locations. Today’s event will bring together representatives from the six locations, including Aberdeen, as well as individuals from across the wider homelessness and private sectors. Prince William will hear about the work of each of the six locations before delivering a short speech in which he will thank partners of the programme.
Local representatives from the Homewards Aberdeen Coalition who are attending today’s event include Angela Scott, CEO of Aberdeen City Council; and Leona McDermid, CEO of Aberdeen Foyer.
