Homelessness prevention by Connection Support Oxford
03.02.2023
Embedded housing workers in children’s social work teams
The context
The housing system can be hard to access and navigate for people who may need advice or support at an earlier point in order to prevent homelessness. Housing can also appear too complicated to deal with for other professionals – including those working in other parts of the same organisation (such as children’s social work). During consultation for the Oxfordshire Homelessness Trailblazer (2017-19), professionals and people with lived experience of homelessness repeatedly put forward the concept of on-hand housing expertise in non-housing settings as a solution to this systemic problem.
The intervention
Embedded housing specialists based in other public services (children/families, social work/health and criminal justice) were employed by Oxford charity, Connection Support. Two workers were assigned to locality/community support, closely linked to multi-agency safeguarding hubs, which act as first point of contact for low/medium child safeguarding concerns. The service offers advice and guidance to professionals and links in with ‘early help’ teams. The embedded housing workers’ role was to prevent homelessness for families with children in need, or with child protection plans.
Housing workers initially were advised, albeit on an anecdotal basis, that housing problems were a primary cause of 10% of children needing to be placed in care - providing a strong impetus for early prevention work. Despite this insight, they discovered housing was something of a ‘blind-spot’ in the child protection system. No questions around housing were asked within safeguarding referrals; social workers perceived housing was too complex a system to navigate. At times, that meant their work to keep a family together could be undermined by a (sometimes avoidable) housing crisis.
Embedded workers were initially greeted with some indifference and even hostility: past housing/social work relations hadn’t always been smooth. But by highlighting points of intervention for families they quickly demonstrated their worth, training social workers on key questions to ask to ensure housing issues were picked up early. 15 referral routes to housing were set up in children’s services. 228 referrals were made, with the main drivers of housing risk being financial (38%), domestic abuse and overcrowding (both 16%). Workers offered advice, advocacy, navigation and case management.
The outcome
69% of referrals received by embedded workers resulted in successful prevention of homelessness for a family. 4% were unsuccessful (the family became homeless), whilst outcomes for the remainder were not fed back. Prevention activity often succeeded because families were more than two months away from homelessness. This was the case in 78% of referrals, so staff could work sufficiently upstream of a crisis. Additionally, the direct ownership and ‘named professional’ in social work assigned to families made joint working easier than in other systems housing workers were embedded in.
The embedded workers’ purpose was to create system change in key public service areas, not set up a permanent role. Whilst housing workers in children’s social work did not continue beyond the Trailblazer funded period, their legacy included an internal housing champion’s network, housing education/training, a network of ‘go-to’ housing contacts and housing questions as a key part of assessments and procedures.
Key insights
- by educating social workers on the realities of the housing system, workers were at times able to support them to propose more realistic housing solutions to families, avoiding homelessness
- embedded workers can smooth relations between services whose legislation, culture and working practices may have previously brought them to blows - at the expense of people using both services
- interventions to prevent family homelessness can be very effective if the right questions are posed early
Find out more…
Mel Thompson, Connections Support, Team Manager: Embedded Housing Workers