In a short period of time, our procurement team has successfully completed the purchase of 135 one bed properties, located throughout London. Given some of the new challenges posed by COVID-19 related working restrictions, this was an amazing achievement.
This was enabled by £8.1m grant funding from the Greater London Authority’s (GLA) Rough Sleeping Accommodation Programme (RSAP) and £19.5m of investment from a Pension Fund.
We are pleased to announce these properties are already housing people who were sleeping rough on the streets of London. These properties will allow us to provide rough sleepers with a permanent place they can call Home, where they feel Safe & Secure, a place from which to plan their Future and improve their Wellbeing.
Rough sleeping has been on a steady increase in London for many years. Recent statistical data from the GLA, 2020/2021, showed that some 11,018 individuals were sleeping rough on the streets of London. Tackling rough sleeping is one of our core competencies alongside helping house those that are homeless, seeking asylum and those fleeing domestic violence.
Our commitment to delivering housing solutions for those sleeping rough on the streets of London mirrors our vision of “being able to provide a place someone can call home, where they can rest, receive support and plan for the future”.
With this excellent public-private funding partnership supporting us, we believe we can continue to deliver long term housing solutions to tackle rough sleeping in London. It is often quoted but this ‘really’ is another excellent example of delivering social impact through public-private investment.
Our teams are busy finalising the plans to deliver a further 75 homes funded through the recent affordable housing grant allocation from the GLA.