Homelessness looks and feels different when you’re a young person. Trying to find somewhere to stay when friends expect you to be at home with your family can be embarrassing as well as frightening.
Trying to revise for GCSEs or A-levels as well as planning which night buses to sleep on can disrupt the route to further education and work.
Picking up the pieces from a family breakdown during the already turbulent transition from child to adult can push young people to breaking point.
At least 150,000 young people approach their council each year for help with housing (pdf). One third are turned away without meaningful support, and only 26,000 are seen as being officially or statutory homeless.
And these figures reveal only those who get as far as the council. The true extent of the problem may be much worse. Our research suggests that as many as 17% of young people have had to sleep somewhere unsafe for at least one night. That’s why Centrepoint has launched the first national freephone service for any young person aged 16-25 who is homeless or worried about homelessness.
We’ve taken over 800 calls so far during a pilot, and the stories make for sorry listening. One young person told us she’d just found out she was homeless as her mum had texted her and told her she couldn’t come back home. One text message and that’s it, you’re on the streets.
We’ve also heard from 16-year-olds sleeping in parks because social services won’t accept responsibility for them. One caller was a pregnant teenage girl sleeping in a garage. Some of the people we’ve heard from have been homeless for years, sofa-surfing and scraping by instead of having the time and space to build a life for themselves.
Many young people do not realise they are homeless. The stereotype of the rough sleeper in the grubby sleeping bag can lead young people to believe that their situation is “not all that bad”. Evidence suggests otherwise. Research shows that young people are taking desperate measures to avoid spending a night on the streets. Some injure themselves to get a bed in A&E; some commit crimes to get a cell for the night; and some put themselves at risk of sexual abuse by using dating apps in order to stay with strangers.
With their budgets being cut, local authorities are struggling to meet the basic needs of homeless people. Preventative measures to combat homelessness are falling through the cracks of mainstream policy. There is help out there, but it is not always easy to find, and young people are left navigating a complex web of localised services and differing provision.
The helpline will help connect young people to practical support and advice about what services they can access. We know that when intervention happens early on, even those in the most difficult situations can successfully turn their lives around.
Their stories differ. But the young people we’ve already spoken to have one thing in common: they appreciate a little bit of humanity. Having someone listen and try to help is a first for many of them.
One email we received read: “I know it’s past your working hours, but I’d just like to thank you for your help today. I don’t think I would’ve gotten a place to sleep without your help. You’ve done a really good thing.”
- If you are a young person worried about homelessness call the Centrepoint helpline: freephone 0808 800 0661.
Gaia Marcus is youth homelessness databank manager at Centrepoint.
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