Homelessness NGOs: Funding Cuts Threaten Irreplaceable Homelessness Work 

Homelessness organizations appeal to the government to abandon plans to cut state grants for social and health organizations. Social and health sector organizations do invaluable work in preventing and eliminating homelessness.

The NGOs express concern about the impact of the cuts on services and support for people experiencing homelessness. NGOs working on homelessness effectively reach out to the most vulnerable and unserved people.

The government has set a target to end long-term homelessness by 2027. Cutting the activities of homelessness organizations would undermine the chances of achieving this target. The work of NGOs plays an invaluable role in homelessness work as a complement to public services.

The statement (in Finnish) points out that cutting homelessness work would only result in short-term savings. The need for public services is growing as people’s challenges deepen if the early support provided by NGOs were not available.

NGOs play an important role in eliminating homelessness

A recent report on the effects of state-assisted homelessness work by NGOs was published. According to it, the state-assisted homelessness work of NGOs is an important part of society’s efforts to reduce homelessness. In the work of organizations, the needs of homeless people are known in more depth than wellbeing services counties, and activities can also be targeted at vulnerable target groups such as young people, those with multiple problems and those outside services.

The strength of the NGO’s homelessness work was also found to be their ability to react quickly: the service needs of the homeless can be met agilely if changes take place in the homelessness field or in the lives of the homeless person. Maintaining the responsiveness of the field of homelessness work would be particularly important in a situation where wellbeing services counties reform and social security cuts may extend the risk of homelessness to a larger number of Finns than before.

The signatories of the statement are the Youth Housing Association NAL ry, the Y-Foundation, No Fixed Abode NGO and the Blue Ribbon Foundation.