Homelessness scheme rolled out

Home4Me, Bondholder Derventio Housing Trust's award-winning homelessness scheme, has been launched in Burton-on-Trent after being commissioned by East Staffordshire Borough Council.

The project was launched in Derby in 2018, after Derby Homes, which manages Bondholder Derby City Council’s homelessness services, asked Derventio to work with 20 of the city’s homeless people who were facing multiple exclusions.

Home4Me is aimed at a hardcore of rough sleepers who have tried but failed to stay off the streets, either because landlords are unwilling to house them, or they have been ejected from accommodation in the past.

It works by giving people a place to live, accompanied by long-term support which aims to help them get to grips with the challenges of living in their own home, dealing with issues such as drugs or alcohol dependency and turning their backs on the behaviours and lifestyle associated with sleeping rough.

Home4Me was praised by former Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government the Rt Hon James Brokenshire MP, when he visited Derventio Housing Trust in January 2019.

The scheme was officially launched in Burton last month, however the coronavirus lockdown has meant that its initial activity had to be different to the original plans.

Jackie Carpenter, assistant director of Derventio Housing Trust, said: “We’re very pleased and proud to be launching Home4Me in Burton in partnership with East Staffordshire Borough Council. Together we’ve agreed how Home4Me can start, working around the restrictions, and we look forward to getting things properly underway.

“This is a brave and ambitious project because it works with people whose challenges in life are extremely complex and whose backgrounds and experience mean that they have struggled to live in a way that the rest of society expects and takes for granted.

“Our Home4Me project has achieved results that a great many other projects and organisations have failed to do, which is a testament to Derventio’s people-focussed outlook, our flexibility and the incredible hard work and commitment of our staff, who have gone above and beyond the call of duty to make this scheme work.”