Three projects make it to the top for prestigious 2022 awards
Three projects from across London have been named as winners of the prestigious London Homelessness Awards for 2022. They will share cash prizes totalling £60,000.
The London Homelessness Awards are sponsored by London Housing Foundation, London Housing Directors, The Mayor of London, Crisis and Shelter.
We received over 30 applications for the awards and after visiting the six shortlisted projects and seeing their presentations, the judges have decided on the three top prize winners, with three other projects specially commended.
They prize winners are (in alphabetical order):
- Greenwich Winter Night Shelter
- Pathway Partnership Programme
- Thames Reach Deptford Reach
Three further projects were particularly commended as making a special contribution to helping combat homelessness in London.
- Camden Adult Pathway Partnership (CAPP) Team
- Providence Row Outreach Psychotherapy
- Riverside Street Buddies
The allocation of the prize money (first prize, £30,000, second, £20,000 and third £10,000), will be revealed at a special event at the Union Chapel on the 12th October, presented by Deputy Mayor Tom Copley.
Margaret Malcolm works with the London Housing Foundation and assessed all of the applicants. She said:
With a strong field of over 30 applicants, each of these projects did well to get to the last six and are doing excellent work. The presentations and stories they told were very powerful. The winners all provide high quality services to a wide range of clients and showcase just how vibrant and innovative the homelessness sector in London continues to be.
The three winning projects (in alphabetical order) are:
Greenwich Winter Night Shelter: Greenwich Winter Night Shelter is a local charity which provides emergency accommodation and support for the homeless in Greenwich. Last year, they moved away from the traditional rotating night shelter to set up a static venue. With support from over 200 volunteers, GWNS now provides single-room accommodation for 9 individuals (including a women’s only wing), 1:1 casework and advocacy, and a pet friendly drop-in day centre where anyone who is homeless or vulnerably housed can access support and facilities. All services have been designed by guests through focus groups to work towards breaking the cycle of homelessness.
Pathway: Since April 2021 five London hospitals (St Georges, Croydon, St Mary’s/Imperial, the Homerton and Ealing/Northwick Park) have introduced Pathway’s model of care for homeless patients and have signed up to Pathway’s Partnership support programme. The model is based on work pioneered at UCLH in 2009. In return for an annual fee, each team receives support and training from Pathway’s core staff, access to their on-line service manual and specialist support networks.
Thames Reach: Thames Reach’s Deptford Reach service provides advice and support to people in the community at risk of, or experiencing, homelessness, working to resolve and signpost issues such as claiming benefits, employment, mental and physical health needs and unsuitable accommodation. Deptford Reach has always had a strong reputation for casework advice that helps prevent and resolve homelessness. An enforced temporary closure due to the first lockdown, followed by a review of the service, allowed Deptford Reach to adapt to prevent homelessness more effectively. Having existed as a day centre for many years, stigmas around homelessness have meant that there is a demand for people to access support in different locations. The team now works in seven spaces across Lewisham. As a result, Deptford Reach now works with a wider range of people, offering drop-in crisis and brief intervention work, with a capacity to resolve complex needs that prevent the loss of accommodation.
The three specially commended projects are:
Camden CAPP: The Camden Adult Pathway Partnership (CAPP) multi-disciplinary team is, delivered by University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (UCLH) and jointly funded by LB Camden and North Central London Clinical Commissioning Group (NCL CCG). It provides outreach nurse led physical health interventions to vulnerable single homeless people living across 15 supported housing services in Camden. CAPP consists of a Clinical Co-ordinator and two nurses who provide health services to residents, including health needs assessments, vital signs, blood tests, referrals to other providers, and support with navigating the health sector.
Providence Row: The Outreach Psychotherapy Team provides a reflective, psychotherapeutic service to clients experiencing homelessness. The service has been available to clients in Tower Hamlets since 2018 and expanded into the City of London in 2021. Verified rough sleepers benefit from highly specialised therapists providing psychotherapy interventions in a unique and innovative way e.g. in their preferred environment, on their terms. The service works with clients who are in the most need of therapy but who are least likely to attend a traditional psychotherapy service.
Riverside: Street Buddies is the first peer-led outreach team in the UK where trained ‘Buddies’ and volunteers, who themselves have experienced homelessness, locate and work with rough sleepers across London. The team support people who have often led complicated lives and spent years living on the streets by providing a lived-experience befriending service. Their aim is to help rough sleepers build social capital by supporting them to engage with services, develop personal skills and social networks, maximise their income, participate in society through sustainable volunteering or work, and move into settled accommodation. They aim to bridge the gap left behind by traditional outreach services.
More details about the London Homelessness Awards can be found at www.lhawards.org.uk
