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11.07.24

Homewards marks first year of progress in Northern Ireland

Prince William’s five-year programme to demonstrate that together it is possible to end homelessness, marking a year of progress across its six locations, including Northern Ireland.

Over the past year, Homewards has been working with Northern Ireland, as well as the programme’s five other locations (Aberdeen; Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole; Lambeth; Newport; 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 Northern Ireland, 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:

    • The Homewards Northern Ireland Coalition has brought together 45 organisations and individuals.

Identifying emerging focus areas:

      • Homewards Northern Ireland has identified tackling young people leaving care as a priority cohort, alongside women. It is also focusing on the role business can play in supporting this work.
      • 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 will support young people leaving care.

Securing unprecedented partnerships:

    • Over 30 local businesses have come together regularly to explore how they can support the Homewards ambitions.

Generating systems change:

    • Work has been focused on bringing together statutory bodies, some for the first time, alongside partners from the voluntary and private sectors to work together to prioritise and achieve the greatest amount of impact.

Working to change the narrative:

    • 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 Northern Ireland.
    • 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 Northern Ireland 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 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 Northern Ireland, 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 Northern Ireland Coalition who are attending today’s event include Kate Martin, CEO of MACs; Grainia Long, Chief Executive of Northern Ireland Housing Executive; Edel Walsh, Regional Social Work Lead for Corporate Parenting at the Department of Health and Kirsten Hewitt, Director of Services at the Simon Community.