The Henry Smith Charity’s New Housing First Programme

Grants of up to £400,000 are available to support small- and medium-sized charities in England, Wales and Northern Ireland helping people with multiple and complex needs who are experiencing homelessness.

This new £1.4 million programme, provided and administered by the Henry Smith Charity, offers funding to support the work of registered charities and other not-for-profit organisations with an annual income of between £100,000 and £5 million. Organisations must be currently delivering (or planning to deliver) Housing First services, which provide homeless people who have complex needs with stable and affordable housing solutions.

The key objectives of the programme are to:

Increase the number of people with multiple and complex needs supported through Housing First.
Increase the number of small to medium sized charities providing Housing First.
Enable existing Housing First providers to increase provision.
Support grantees to develop practice and share learning and experiences.

Established organisations with a track record of working with this client group can apply for grants of between £200,000 and £400,000 for up to four years. Funded services must be delivered in line with the Housing First Principles, which are:

People have a right to a home.
Flexible support is provided for as long as is needed.
Housing and support are separated.
Individuals have choice and control.
An active engagement approach is used.
The service is based on people’s strengths, goals and aspirations.
A harm reduction approach is used.

Grants are flexible and can be used for anything required to provide a high-quality service, including staffing and on-costs for support provision, reasonable overheads and costs associated with setting up a service, and personalised budgets and other supports to enable tenancies to be maintained.

The deadline for expressions of interest is 4 November 2019.

Full details…