Sustaining Frontline Housing Support: Why a 2% Uplift is Not Enough
The proposed 2% uplift to the Housing Support Grant is a welcome recognition to Homelessness services. However, the reality across the sector is that this increase falls short of sustaining delivery at a level that meets both the scale and complexity of need we are seeing across communities.
At Taff, we deliver housing-related support through 14 specialist services across four local authorities, employing over 100 colleagues and supporting more than 1,000 people each year. As an experienced, Supported Accommodation provider, our services span young people and family supported accommodation, community based floating support, specialist relocation schemes and 24-hour hostel-based services for people experiencing homelessness.
All our services are delivered within the principles of a Psychologically Informed Environments, ensuring our approach is trauma-informed, evidence-based, and responsive to individual needs. We believe that everyone deserves to take their next steps and these services exists to help them take it.
However, across our services we are experiencing sustained and growing pressure. Referral volumes are increasing, the complexity and acuity of support needs are rising, and significantly more time, skill, and resource are required per individual. Alongside this, services continue to face challenges in recruitment and retention linked to wage competitiveness, all against a backdrop of rising operational costs.
Support workers remain the backbone of housing and homelessness services. When other systems are at capacity, it is frontline housing support staff who remain present managing risk, responding to crisis, supporting disclosures of trauma, and providing stability where there may be none. Unlike many other services, homelessness support cannot pause delivery or turn people away.
Behind these pressures are people delivering this work every day. The following case study reflects the lived experience of a frontline support worker working within housing and homelessness services.
Colleague Case Study: “We Are the Constant When Others Can’t Be”
Support workers are the unseen backbone of frontline housing and homelessness services. We are, quite literally, the ‘jack of all trades’ within a system where so many other services are at capacity. When an ambulance has a four-hour wait, it is the support worker who stays administering first aid and sometimes delivering life-saving intervention.
When mental health services are overwhelmed, it is the support worker who manages the crisis. Again, sometimes providing life-saving support. When someone discloses sexual violence, domestic abuse, trauma, exploitation, bereavement, or suicide risk, it is the support worker who steps in.
When people have no food, no capacity, and no one else, it is the support worker who shows up. Much of our role is about being the bridge. Building relationships strong enough to help people engage with services they may otherwise avoid. That takes emotional labour: sharing just enough of yourself to build trust, while holding professional boundaries.
We stand at the frontline of trauma, adversity, anger, crisis, and disclosure. We develop resilience unlike any other, moving from tragedy to celebration in the space of minutes. Every person needs something different, and adaptability isn’t optional it’s essential.
That adaptability takes energy. It takes emotional labour. And it takes skilled decompression at the end of every shift. This work takes strength more than most people will ever see.
Working in homelessness also brings a unique level of frustration. We often have to fight to have risks recognised, concerns heard, and responsibility shared. Until that happens, the risk sits with us. Unlike other services, we cannot say we don’t have capacity. What keeps us going are the successes. Sometimes rare, but deeply meaningful. We hold onto them tightly, hoping the next one is just around the corner.
Yet our pay does not reflect the level of training we hold, the emotional toll we carry, or the responsibility placed upon us. A 2% increase in Housing Support Grant funding does not come close to meeting a 6.7% increase in the Real Living Wage. Many of us now spend a portion of our wages on wellbeing just to stay well enough to continue doing this work supporting residents, managing complex caseloads, coordinating moves, advocating for services, and providing safety, stability, and hope.
Without wage increases that keep pace with the cost of living, experienced staff will be forced to choose between their wellbeing and the work they care deeply about. And many already are.
The sector needs experienced, skilled, and resilient support workers. The only way to sustain them and to reduce burnout and turnover is through sufficient, reliable investment. Investing in support workers is investing in prevention, safety, and long-term stability for some of the most vulnerable people in our communities.”
This experience reflects what we are seeing across the sector. Current funding uplifts do not keep pace with the rising cost of living, increases in the Real Living Wage, or the emotional and professional demands placed on the workforce. Without sufficient and reliable investment, services are forced to make difficult decisions that risk capacity, continuity, and quality.
If we are serious about prevention, sustainability, and long-term outcomes for individuals and communities, housing support must be funded in a way that reflects reality on the ground.
To support sustainability, protect frontline capacity, and ensure prevention continues to deliver positive outcomes for individuals, communities, and the wider public interest, we believe the following consideration would make a meaningful difference:
To ensure housing support remains sustainable and effective, funding must keep pace with workforce costs, reflect rising complexity of need, support retention and wellbeing, provide longer-term certainty, and protect prevention as a core public service.
Housing support works.
But it can only continue to work if the workforce delivering it is valued, retained, and properly resourced.
