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A collaboration from the LGA and Local Partnerships on “Lessons learned from rough sleeping during COVID” including guidance and webinar.

WEBINAR: Delivered on 3 December 2020: “Lessons learned from councils’ response to rough sleeping during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Panellists:

Cllr David Renard, Leader, Swindon Council (Chair) and Strategic Lead for Rough Sleepers at Birmingham City Council

Stephen Philpott

Jenny Coombs, Project Director, Housing at Local Partnerships.

The purpose of Refit business case guide is to provide guidance and information to public sector organisations on the benefits and use of the Re:fit framework to support an options appraisal or business case.

This document is intended to assist you when completing your options appraisal or business case. The text provided within this document contains Re:fit-specific responses that would be suitable (adapted for your organisation and proposed Re:fit project as may be necessary) for relevant areas of the business case.

Impact Report 2019-20. Local Partnerships occupies a unique position in the public sector. Our purpose is to help organisations face the ever-increasing challenge of meeting rising demands for services with shrinking budgets. In 2019-20, we built on the successes of recent years and delivered excellent results for our clients. The feedback we have received, captured later in this report, reflects the positive impact we make, fulfilling our mission and purpose.

National Audit Office published a report on the expiry of Private Finance Initiative (PFI) contracts. It highlights that public sector bodies risk underestimating the time, resources and complexity involved in managing the expiry process. We have produced guidance to help you manage this process successfully.

One of the main principles highlighted in our guidance is that it is never too soon to start thinking about what is required. In the first part of this decade over 50 operational PFI contracts are due to expire. This number rises to 200 contracts over the next 10 years.

Housing people who were rough sleeping and those at risk who have been accommodated due to COVID-19

At the end of March the government wrote a letter to the leader of every local authority in England asking them to accommodate all people sleeping rough or at risk of sleeping rough and to find alternative accommodation for those in “shelters” where they could not easily self-isolate by the end of the weekend, in order to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Based on MHCLG figures, local authorities have since moved an estimated 90% of rough sleepers known at the start of the lockdown into hotels, bed and breakfasts and other temporary accommodation, and accommodated up to 15,000 individuals.

Local authorities now have the task of sourcing alternative accommodation for this group of people rather than allowing them to return to the streets when lockdown ends. This task is complex, as the majority of rough sleepers need support, at least temporarily, as well as housing, but many do not fall within the definition of those for whom local authorities have a statutory homelessness responsibility to secure accommodation.

A series of reports from Local Partnerships, “Delivering waste efficiencies” seek to provide examples to enable others to benefit from authority experiences and best practise, and thereby to consider how the learnings could be applied to their own authority and support them in making their own savings.

Guidance is being updated regularly by government and the waste management industry in relation to local authorities and waste and recycling.

Critical advice and guidance may be found at these sources via:

• • Defra guidance on prioritising waste collection services
• • Waste Industry Safety and Health Forum guidance on waste management activities
• • CIWM briefing and guidance for the UK waste management sector

In this briefing note, Local Partnerships seeks to provide further guidance for waste authorities with significant private sector partnerships that are experiencing difficulties in balancing waste services resources as a consequence of contracting arrangements that are coming under stress because of the COVID-19 pandemic