5. Statement by the Minister for Housing and Local Government: Coronavirus (COVID-19)

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 5:49 pm on 17 March 2020.

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Photo of Julie James Julie James Labour 5:49, 17 March 2020

That's an absolutely excellent point. I haven't yet contacted The Big Issue, but I think officials have it on their list of things to do, so we will want to know how we can support them. I'm very concerned about sofa surfers, as they are called, or people who are on the edge of rough sleeping, sliding down, because, obviously, as families self-isolate at home, they're unlikely to be as accepting of people kipping on their sofa, or whatever, as normal. So, we're very alert to the idea that we might have a sudden surge of people who become quickly homeless, or more quickly than they would otherwise do so. You'll know that in normal times, very recently we've been running a big campaign to get people to recognise themselves as homeless, and we'll be continuing to do that as much as possible as well. But we are very concerned that exactly that will happen.

In terms of the rough-sleepers, I will be putting out a statement later this week, but basically what we're trying to do, obviously, is make sure that people can get in where they can get in, that we have cohort services. So, effectively, if you're infected you will have a set of services—or if you're potentially infected. If you're not infected, you'll have a different set of services. There are many different cohorts in the rough-sleeping fraternity as well—people with other issues that we will have to make sure are in cohorts and not just randomly distributed. There will be big issues about whether we can secure hotel accommodation or bed-and-breakfast accommodation. Actually, ironically, of course, because of the virus, that's more available than it would normally be, so we will be making use of that. 

And there will be a cohort of people we cannot get in, for all kinds of reasons. We know that some rough-sleepers have real issues with that. So, we will be looking to establish, particularly in the four cities that have the acutest problem in Wales, areas of safety for tents and where we can put sanitation and health provision and so on in for people where we can't get them inside. Absolutely, without a shadow of a doubt, there will be some people in that cohort. So, we will be doing that and I will put a statement out later in the week when we're more certain of what we'll be doing, but we'll be responding to that.

I was delighted to see that the UK Ministry has just announced this initial, as it's called, £3.2 million. We'll be very anxious to see how much of that will come to us and what we can do with that additional money. So, all the things that I've said is stuff we're already doing with our own stuff, so anything we can do in addition to that we'll be looking at. 

I think The Big Issue is a very interesting one; we'll certainly be taking that up. As the First Minister has said repeatedly this afternoon, we're certainly not the repository of good ideas, so anything else that you can think of that might be helpful, we'll be really glad to hear.