This is the opinion of the government, which on Monday presented a proposal to reduce the number of homeless and abolish homelessness in Denmark.
– People should not live on the streets or for whole or half years in hostels. We must act differently and ambitiously, says Minister of Social Affairs Astrid Krag (S).
The government will spread the housing first model, which Norway and Finland, among others, are using successfully.
It means that a homeless person is first offered housing. Then you start helping with, for example, mental problems.
The model has great potential. In fact, so large that at least 90 percent – if not all homeless – can be helped by spreading the model housing first, which the government is proposing.
This is the opinion of Ask Svejstrup, head of the secretariat of the National Organization of the Homeless (Sand).
– In principle, everyone will be able to be helped with this model if you provide the right housing support after a thorough investigation of the individual, he says.
The model is especially good for the homeless who have not been on the streets for a long time, Ask Svejstrup assesses.
An example is 27-year-old Simon Sørensen. He was homeless for two and a half years before he managed to find a home with the help of, among others, a colleague.
He thinks he would have been in a completely different place today if he had gotten a home earlier. For life on the streets has left its mark.
– When you experience being woken up with beatings while sleeping on the street, it is difficult not to develop post-traumatic stress, he says.
With the housing project “Closer to II”, which was presented in mid-October, the government will provide 2900 affordable housing. They must be found among both newly built homes and already existing homes.
Vibe Klarup, who is chairman of the Council for the Socially Vulnerable and director of the Home for All Alliance, has an expectation that the scheme will really take off.
– I think there is a good starting point for actually saying that in ten years there will be no more homeless people in Denmark, she says.
According to Vibe Klarup, the concrete requirement for the municipalities to provide social support – even when the homeless have been housed – is crucial to bring the problem to life.
However, there is a group of homeless people of about ten percent, which can be more difficult for the municipalities to help through housing first, Ask Svejstrup believes.
Therefore, there must continue to be a focus on creating other offers. Here he points, among other things, to housing offers, where residents get their own housing, but which are part of a community. It must ensure that citizens do not sink into loneliness and abuse.
However, the government’s proposal is not enough to reduce the number of homeless, it sounds from several parties in the Folketing.
Both DF and SF emphasize that the help for the homeless’ mental problems must be in the forefront, so that the affordable housing for the homeless will be a help.
Source: The Nordic Page