Homelessness has a devastating impact on people and communities. For individuals, homelessness damages physical and mental health, causes and exacerbates trauma,
and pushes people into vulnerable and exploitative situations, further away from opportunities to build healthy, fulfilled lives. Not only does homelessness stop people
from reaching their potential, but it also prevents them from integrating and fully participating in their communities and wider society.
Whilst homelessness affects households across the country, non-UK nationals are more vulnerable to homelessness than people with UK citizenship, and those with restricted or No Recourse to Public Funds (NRPF)1 and/or unsettled immigration status even more so.
Migrants are impacted by the same socioeconomic conditions that drive homelessness across the population as a whole. This includes low-wage labour, the lack of affordable housing, personal needs including mental health challenges, the need for treatment for substance misuse and trauma; and the challenge of navigating multiple, complex, systems across housing, welfare, health, and social care.
However, for many migrants, these challenges are compounded by conditions created by the immigration system. People with restricted or No Recourse to Public Funds
(NRPF) face unique challenges and barriers that trap them in destitution,2 and which make it almost impossible to move on from homelessness and rough sleeping.
This can include being locked out of the vital support services that exist to help people move on from homelessness, and denied assistance with other issues they may face, due to restrictions imposed on them because of their immigration status. Whilst immigration policies have long been a cause of homelessness and destitution, changes to the immigration and asylum system enacted through the Illegal Migration Act 2023 could drive an increase in the number of people seeking asylum at risk of homelessness and destitution, if it is not immediately repealed. As well as restricting the routes to asylum and settlement for many recently arrived migrants in the UK, leaving them in a “permanent limbo”, which will drive further disengagement from support networks.
No one should become, or remain, homeless because of their immigration status. Preventing homelessness must be a considered part of the immigration system, alongside greater collaboration with housing, welfare, and voluntary and statutory services, and improved recourse to justice through our legal systems. Through this we can deliver the changes needed to ensure that the immigration system no longer drives homelessness, and instead contributes to a shared goal of preventing and ending homelessness for all.
These changes include:
1. Recognising and addressing the impact that restrictions on public funds have on homelessness.
2. Stopping the flow of homelessness from the asylum system.
3. Expanding access to quality free immigration and welfare advice.
4. Taking a cross-departmental approach to tackling all forms of rough sleeping and homelessness.
5. Repealing the Illegal Migration Act 2023 at the earliest possible opportunity