Issue - meetings

Cabinet Member: Adult Social Care & Public Health

Forward Plan Ref: 2020/158

Contact: Sarah Roberts, Commissioning Manager Tel: 07720 805979

Report by Assistant Director Housing & Social Care Commissioning (CA8).

To inform Cabinet that we are going out to the market to recommission services to support people who are homeless or at risk of homelessness including rough sleepers.

The Cabinet is RECOMMENDED to agree the proposed approach to commissioning services to support homeless adults and adults at risk of homelessness in Oxfordshire.

Recommendations agreed.

Cabinet considered a report setting out how the partnership of six Oxfordshire councils and the Clinical Commissioning Group intended to recommission services to support people who were homeless or at risk of homelessness including rough sleepers.

Councillor Sobia Afridi, Shadow Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care, welcomed the report and the partnership working involved in this process.  She asked that the contract should ensure adequate high quality emergency and temporary accommodation for adults with mental health issues.  She had received reports that the current provider had turned people away on the basis of being too high a risk.

Councillor Lawrie Stratford introduced the report and expressed concern that more people may become at risk of homelessness as a result of the pandemic.  He emphasised the importance of the partnership with the district and city councils who had responsibility for housing, ensuring that this was linked with the County Council’s related responsibility for wellbeing.  There was a determination that together they could resolve the challenge.

Councillor Stratford concurred with comments made earlier in the meeting by Councillors Afridi and Brighouse about the importance of access to mental health professionals.

Gillian Douglas, Assistant Director Housing and Social Care Commissioning,  added that a county-wide strategy for homelessness, that reflected the importance of health, social care and mental health, was currently out to consultation and she encouraged everyone to access it on the council’s website.

The Chairman noted that this alliance also included Oxfordshire Clinical Commissioning Group and stressed the importance of getting people into a home of their own rather than temporary housing.

RESOLVED: to agree theproposed approach to commissioning services to support homeless adults and adults at risk of homelessness in Oxfordshire.