Policy Officer, Community Justice
The Glasgow Alliance to End Homelessness (GAEH) is a unique approach that aims to end homelessness and rough sleeping in the city by 2030. It consists of 10 organisations, working in partnership (Aspire, CrossReach, Glasgow Homelessness Involvement and Feedback Team (GHIFT), the City Council, Homeless Network Scotland, Sacro, The Mungo Foundation, The Salvation Army, Wheatley Care and Ypeople) with people who have personal experience of homelessness having an equal role in the work of the Alliance and an important part of the recruitment process.
The Alliance is also supported by an Advisory Council of international experts. The Homelessness Network Scotland have mapped out how we got to this point and also has a useful FAQ page. The Alliance was first launched in February 2020 following the launch of an inquiry from the Scottish Housing Regulator in December 2019 into the council’s homelessness services.
This innovative approach acknowledges the complex needs of people who experience homelessness, including: multiple exclusions; involvement in the criminal justice system; poor physical and/or mental health; experience of trauma; care experience as a child/young person; and addictions. Significant resources will be made available for the Alliance, with £187m allocated for its work. This support is funded by the Scottish Government Third Sector Division.
The principles set out in the Alliance Agreement are:
- Co-production.
- To assume collective responsibility for all of the risks involved in providing services under the Alliance Agreement.
- Make decisions on a ‘Best for people using services’ basis.
- Commit to unanimous, principle and value based-decision making on all key issues.
- To adopt a culture of ‘no fault, no blame’ between the Alliance participants insofar as is practicable.
- Adopt open book accounting and transparency in all matters relating to the Alliance.
- Appoint and select key roles on a best person basis.
- Act in accordance with agreed Alliance values and behaviours at all times.
- Ensure the Alliance does not act in a way that damages the reputation of the Council and or Integration Joint Board.
A full prospectus for the service can be found on Your Support Your Way website. The director for GAEH, Mark Kelvin, is now in post. David Pentland, GHIFT and Alliance Leadership Team member commented:
“We’re delighted to welcome Mark to the Alliance team. We were impressed by Mark’s passion for the Alliance and his commitment to working alongside Glasgow’s citizens to tackle homelessness, we’re looking forward to seeing him advance our plans.”
Mark said:
“I am really excited about the work of the Alliance and the opportunity to shape this new role.
“Glasgow is a proud city and by working together to create a movement for change we can tackle the challenges that homelessness presents and achieve the vision of the Alliance – to end homelessness in Glasgow by 2030.”
Susanne Millar, Chief Officer, Glasgow City Health & Social Care Partnership, said:
“Congratulations to Mark on his appointment to this exciting and challenging new role. Glasgow’s Alliance to End Homelessness is an innovative new approach to tackling what is a highly complex social issue. Collaboration is at the heart of Glasgow’s strategic alliancing approach which is the first of its kind in Scotland and we look forward to working closely with Mark and the other partners going forward to continue to enhance and transform the delivery of homeless services in the city.”
The Hard Edges Scotland report by Lankelly Chase (CLICK THE PICTURE LINK BELOWS) outlines the linkages between homelessness, offending and substance dependency. The Community Justice Glasgow Partnership held a joint event last year to launch this report and explore what it meant for the Community Justice. You can read about that event in an article from the Annual Reporter 2019-20:
‘THE HARD EDGES OF WOMEN IN THE JUSTICE SYSTEM – COMMUNITY JUSTICE GLASGOW’S HARD EDGES EVENT’.
For background on why Housing is such an important focus for the Community Justice Glasgow Partnership, you can read the article:
‘SPOTLIGHTING NEW APPROACHES TO HOMELESSNESS & REDUCING RE-OFFENDING IN GLASGOW’ from out 2018-19 Annual Reporter.
Link to Hard Edges Report
The Findings
