{"id":21730,"date":"2025-08-12T12:58:30","date_gmt":"2025-08-12T11:58:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.taipawb.org\/?post_type=blog&p=21730"},"modified":"2026-07-08T20:16:37","modified_gmt":"2026-07-08T20:16:37","slug":"a-homelessness-bill-for-all","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.taipawb.org\/cy\/news\/2025\/a-homelessness-bill-for-all\/","title":{"rendered":"A Homelessness Bill For All"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Our CEO Alicja Zalesinska spoke to WHQ<\/strong><\/span><\/a> to reflect on the equalities potential of the new legislation \u2013 and how it could make an even greater difference. You can find the link to subscribe for more of this content at Wales<\/p>\n

‘ independent housing and regeneration magazine here: WHQ Subscribe<\/a>.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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The new Homelessness and Social Housing Allocation (Wales) Bill is a significant and welcome development. It reflects a bold ambition to make homelessness in Wales rare, brief and non-recurrent \u2013 an ambition that aligns closely with the values we hold at Tai Pawb, and our long-standing campaign, alongside Back the Bill partners, for a Right to Adequate Housing in law. We were pleased to contribute to the development of the Bill, including through the Expert Review Panel and our research exploring the experiences of people from marginalised groups facing homelessness. It\u2019s encouraging to see many of the ideas and principles from that work reflected in the legislation. There is much to be positive about. The extension of prevention duties from 56 days to six months has the potential to be a gamechanger, helping services to step in earlier and offer more effective support. We also warmly welcome the emphasis on person-centred prevention, support and accommodation plans, and the recognition of the need to ask and act when people may be at risk of homelessness.<\/p>\n

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The Real Test<\/strong><\/h4>\n

As always, the real test will be in the implementation \u2013 and that\u2019s where the equalities dimension becomes critical. People from some diverse communities often experience homelessness in different ways and are at much higher risk of homelessness. Ensuring services are responsive to this \u2013 through accessible communication, inclusive design, and culturally competent support \u2013 will be vital if the Bill is to succeed for everyone. We\u2019re especially pleased to see the inclusion of accessible housing registers (AHRs), something Tai Pawb has long advocated for. Used well, these can transform how disabled people access suitable housing. Our research has shown the value of standardised accessibility categorisation, regionally aligned registers and the proactive mapping of accessible homes. The potential is huge \u2013 and we\u2019re committed to working with local authorities and the Welsh Government to ensure these registers are meaningful, usable and impactful.<\/p>\n

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Compromise is part of the process<\/strong><\/h4>\n
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Of course, no legislation can do everything, and we recognise that compromise is part of the process. But there are a few areas we hope can be strengthened as the Bill moves forward. For example, while the duty to ask and act is welcome, the current exclusion of bodies like the Home Office and primary care may limit its reach – particularly for refugees and families with no recourse to public funds. Ensuring these groups don\u2019t fall through the cracks will be important. Similarly, there may be scope to revisit how the local connection test applies to young LGBTQ+ people, who often face homelessness due to rejection or abuse and rely on chosen families and support networks in \u2018non-local\u2019 areas. A more flexible interpretation here could help prevent repeat homelessness for this group as well as for migrant communities. On Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities, we note that some of the White Paper\u2019s proposals around requirements for culturally appropriate accommodation haven\u2019t carried through into the draft Bill. We hope this can be explored further in future legislative steps and guidance. Overall, the Bill sets a strong foundation \u2013 and it\u2019s clear that, in principle, multiple stakeholders are pulling in the same direction here. With the right implementation, resources, and attention to diversity, this legislation has the potential to make a lasting difference. At Tai Pawb, we\u2019re ready to support that journey \u2013 helping to ensure the new duties are inclusive, evidence-based and grounded in the lived experience of those most affected. This is a real opportunity to make homelessness in Wales not only rare, brief and non-recurrent \u2013 but also to support a fair and equitable homelessness response, rooted in people-led solutions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Our CEO Alicja Zalesinska spoke to WHQ to reflect on the equalities potential of the new legislation \u2013 and how it could make an even greater difference. You can find the link to subscribe for more of this content at Wales ‘ independent housing and regeneration magazine here: WHQ Subscribe.   The new Homelessness and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":25380,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[122,120,121,117,132,133],"tags":[],"temporary-categorisation-from-im":[115],"class_list":["post-21730","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-housing","category-legislation","category-policy","category-resources","category-socio-economic-disadvantage","category-socio-economic-inequality","temporary-categorisation-from-im-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taipawb.org\/cy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21730","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taipawb.org\/cy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taipawb.org\/cy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taipawb.org\/cy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taipawb.org\/cy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21730"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.taipawb.org\/cy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21730\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25381,"href":"https:\/\/www.taipawb.org\/cy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21730\/revisions\/25381"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taipawb.org\/cy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25380"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taipawb.org\/cy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taipawb.org\/cy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taipawb.org\/cy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21730"},{"taxonomy":"temporary-categorisation-from-im","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taipawb.org\/cy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/temporary-categorisation-from-im?post=21730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}