Rough sleeping in England soars by 20% in just a year: ‘It’s a red alert warning’

The number of people rough sleeping in England has skyrocketed by 20% in just a year as frontline charities described the siutation on the streets as a “humanitarian emergency”.

The annual rough sleeping snapshot found an estimated 4,667 people were homeless on the streets on a single night in autumn 2024, up a fifth and 769 people on the 3,898 people counted in 2023.

The rise is the third consecutive year in which rough sleeping has increased but remains 2% lower than the 2017 peak when frontline workers counted 4,751 people.

The number of people sleeping rough more than doubled under the Tories with 1,768 counted in 2010 when the party first came into office. The 2024 total remains 164% higher than 15 years ago.

Labour have, so far, been unable to turn the tide but have pledged to spend £1bn this year on tackling rough sleeping and homelessness with a renewed shift towards preventing people from ending up on the streets in the first place.

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Earlier this week, the government announced a further £30m in emergency funding to prevent people facing rent arrears from being evicted into homelessness.

Lord John Bird, Big Issue founder and crossbench peer, said Thursday’s (27 February) statistics demonstrate the need for a long-term strategy to tackle homelessness, which the government has pledged to publish later this summer.

“Rough sleeping remains our biggest national source of shame,” said Lord Bird.

“The government has spent record levels trying to cope with the emergency on our streets over the winter, and while this is crucially important, it must not be mistaken for a solution to this crisis. We have been promised a full strategy for ending homelessness by the summer, and prevention must be at the heart of this. Truly preventative action requires clever thinking, long-term investment and collaboration on a huge scale – both between government departments and with third-sector partners like the Big Issue.

“Ultimately, the government must go further and move faster on policies that pull the three million Brits living in extreme poverty up and away homelessness. Only then will we save people from a freefall that ends in one place – the hard, cold streets of our towns and cities.”

The yearly official rough sleeping snapshot sees frontline charities and local authorities undertake a single-night count or estimate in the autumn.

The approach is considered less accurate than the London-only Combined Homelessness and Information Network (Chain) statistics that track street homelessness over time in the English capital.

But the nationwide snapshot figures still showcase why the state of homelessness is considered a crisis across the country.

The statistics show eight in every 1,000 people in England are rough sleeping.

London and the South East account for 45% of the total number of people sleeping rough.

The capital also saw 16% increase in the number of people counted on the streets in 2024 – up to 1,318 from 1,132 in 2023 – while the North West was the only region that saw a decrease in numbers, down 2%.

The majority of people sleeping rough in England are male, aged over 26 years old and from the UK – a similar demographic to previous years.

The government also published rough sleeping data framework data – management information that is considered less robust than the snapshot count but keeps a more frequent count of street homelessness.

The data showed an estimated 7,524 people slept rough over the month in December 2024 – with an estimated 2.2 times more people sleeping rough over the month compared to a single night.

John Glenton, executive director of care and support at Riverside – one of the largest providers of accommodation for people affected by rough sleeping in England – said the figures are “a red alert warning to the government that the housing crisis is now becoming a humanitarian emergency”.

Emma Haddad, chief executive of St Mungo’s, said: “Emergency funding continues to be essential to tackle this homelessness crisis, but longer-term funding for preventive programmes alongside improved housing affordability and supply are also needed to fix the root causes and move away from crisis response.”

As well as the annual rough sleeping count, the government also released statutory homelessness statistics which showed a slight decrease in the number of households calling on councils for support when losing their home.

A total of 88,690 households were assessed by councils to see if they needed homelessness support between July and September 2024, down 2% on 2023.

But the number of households living in temporary accommodation continued to hit record highs. A total of 126,040 households are living in temporary accommodation including 164,040 children. The number of households in temporary accommodation has increased 15.7% in the space of a year

Alexia Murphy, chief executive of Depaul UK, told Big Issue that the government is correct to look to the long-term as it looks to reduce homelessness.

But with record numbers facing homelessness in England, frontline services need more resources to keep up with the housing emergency.

Chancellor Rachel Reeves has been urged to reform funding for the homelessness sector at this summer’s spending review.

“While it’s encouraging the UK government is working on a long-term strategy to end homelessness, we cannot overlook the immediate and very real crisis facing people forced to sleep in terrible and unsafe conditions, on the streets – tonight, tomorrow and beyond, and today’s increase in the homelessness and rough sleeping data continues to highlight the need for urgent action,” said Murphy.

“Rough sleeping services are being pushed to the brink as funding is getting ever tighter, making it harder to provide the support people desperately need – there’s also an upcoming rise in national insurance, which will add further financial strain on charities like ours. That’s why we are calling on businesses, individuals, and communities to support our work, whether through donations, fundraising, or advocacy, so we can continue to help those experiencing homelessness.

“However, without urgent investment from the government, vital services, including ours, will struggle to keep up with growing demand. Immediate and targeted action is required to help tackle this crisis, and prevent more people from becoming homeless in the first place.”

Writing for the Big Issue this week, homelessness minister Rushanara Ali said that Labour would “take difficult decisions now to reverse the years of failure we inherited, we can get back on track to ending homelessness“.

Ali said: “The effects are devastating on those left homeless by the worst housing crisis in living memory. 

“Everyone deserves a safe, decent, affordable home and yet this is out of reach for many people across our country.”

Responding to the rough sleeping statistics, Rick Henderson, chief executive of Homeless Link, the national membership body for frontline homelessness charities in England, described rising numbers of the street as “beyond devastating and shameful”.

“In recent memory we almost halved rough sleeping (from its 2017 peak). We know what works and yet once again the situation is getting worse every year. More and more lives are being irreparably damaged, failed by the systems that meant to support them,” said Henderson.

“We can see the causes of homelessness wherever we look. A welfare system unfit for purpose, an acute shortage of truly affordable housing, extremely over-stretched homelessness, health and social care services and a disconnect between government policies – from hospitals and prisons discharging people onto the streets to people leaving the asylum system with nowhere to live.

“This must end here. The Labour government must do what its predecessor failed to – to put the right funding and support in place to prevent and end homelessness for good.”

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