Description of the goods or services required
The Welsh Government wishes to commission an independent Review of the use of Priority Need in Wales. The Review will need to investigate the potential impacts of any change to Priority Need (whether that is an amendment or abolition) on local authorities, housing providers, the third sector and of course those accessing housing support.
The concept of Priority Need for homelessness services dates back to the Housing (Homeless Persons) Act 1977, and was the key element of Part 7 of the Housing Act 1996 which placed duties on local authorities in both England and Wales to secure permanent accommodation for unintentionally homeless people who met one or more of the priority need categories.
The National Assembly for Wales used secondary legislative powers to introduce The Homeless person’s (Priority need) (Wales) Order 2001 which broadened the categories of people to be considered in priority need to include, for example, care leavers, 16 and 17 year olds and former prisoners homeless after being released.
Part 2 of the Housing (Wales) Act 2014 significantly altered the way in which homelessness services are provided to people in Wales, putting in place new prevention and relief duties which were not dependant on whether a person was considered to have a priority need.
However, the priority need test does retain a fundamental position in the 2014 Act, not just as a final safety net for the most vulnerable in our society, where earlier prevention duties have been unsuccessful, but also as a determining factor in whether temporary accommodation is provided while earlier duties to homeless persons are being actioned.
The current list of priority need categories in Wales is as follows:
i. a pregnant woman;
ii. a person with whom a dependent child resides;
iii. someone vulnerable as a result of old age, mental illness or handicap, physical disability, or other special reason;
iv. homeless as a result of an emergency such as flood, fire or other disaster;
v. someone who is homeless as a result of domestic abuse;
vi. 16 and 17 year olds;
vii. 18-21 year olds who are care leavers
viii. 18-21 year olds at particular risk of sexual or financial exploitation;
ix. ex-service men or women who have been homeless since leaving those forces;
x. a person who has a local connection with the area and is vulnerable as a result of being an ex-prisoner.
Vulnerability test
The Act defines the test which should be undertaken to assess vulnerability. For ‘other special reason’ the definition provided is:
(a) the person would be less able to fend for himself or herself (as a result of that reason) if the person were to become street homeless than would an ordinary homeless person who becomes street homeless, and
(b) this would lead to the person suffering more harm than would be suffered by the ordinary homeless person;
While measures were taken to make the new Welsh test more inclusive than the Pereira Test, which was then in place in England (as a result of case law), local authorities still retain the power to determine someone’s eligibility and there is a growing body of evidence that the test is being implemented differently, not just between local authorities, but within the same local authority.
There have been increasing concerns expressed from third sector providers as to the effectiveness of the current approach to priority need in Wales and evidence presented to the Equalities, Local Government and Communities (ELGC) Committee called for the phased abolition of priority need.
NOTE: The authority is using eTenderwales to carry out this procurement process. To obtain further information record your interest on Sell2Wales at https://www.sell2wales.gov.wales/search/search_switch.aspx?ID=88860
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