Examining the gap between the Government’s commitments and the reality of its immigration policies: Homelessness Strategy.
By Isabella Rooney, Research and Engagement Policy Officer, and Monserrat Escudero, Policy and Communications Manager on VAWG.
A change in leadership, a new opportunity
A change in national leadership gives the government an opportunity to back its ambitious pledges with real action. Tackling homelessness, child poverty, violence against women and girls (VAWG) and modern slavery requires a shift from scapegoating rhetoric and counterproductive policies, to evidence-based safeguards for the most vulnerable.
In his first speech as Prime Minister, Andy Burnham promised “to end rough sleeping in our country.” ¹ We welcome this commitment: many of the women we support are forced to sleep rough by systemic barriers, rising living costs and experiences of abuse and exploitation. However, the Prime Minister has also backed the Home Secretary’s immigration and asylum policies, which will undoubtedly drive up rough sleeping and homelessness.
Using our frontline experience, in this 3-piece series LAWRS has analysed three of the government’s key policy strategies – on homelessness, child poverty and VAWG – to see if they hold water when it comes to migrant women and girls. These strategies aim to make homelessness rare, lift half a million children out of poverty, and halve VAWG within a decade.
Our analysis reveals a glaring hole: migrant women and girls are systematically excluded through lack of provisions and a failure to address their needs. More importantly, the strategies’ ambitious objectives will also be directly undermined by the government’s immigration and asylum policies.
Following the Makerfield election, Andy Burnham promised “a country that works fairly for everywhere and for everybody”.² During the Labour Party Conference, he committed to drawing “a line on a decade of division.”³ We are holding the Prime Minister accountable to these promises. His government has an opportunity to create lasting change for our communities. But our analysis shows that none of these commitments will be realised if migrant women and girls are left behind.
Homelessness Strategy
The Prime Minister’s pledge on rough sleeping mirrors the aims set out by the Homelessness Strategy. However, our analysis demonstrates that these aims will be impossible without specific measures to support at-risk migrants. Here are a few key objectives outlined in the Homelessness Strategy and the ways they fall short:
- Reduce barriers to accessing support:
The Homelessness Strategy states that discrimination and communication barriers block support for those at risk of homelessness. However, it completely ignores the largest barrier for migrant women – the No Recourse to Public Funds (NRPF) condition. Before becoming Labour Party leader, Andy Burnham advocated for NRPF to be abolished because of its impact on homelessness; as Prime Minister, he has back-tracked on this. His support for the ‘Earned Settlement’ policies also risks increasing barriers to support for those at risk of homelessness, and will see people subjected to NRPF for longer, with access to public funds penalised.
- Improve statutory and local authority responses:
The government’s proposals undermine the Strategy’s efforts to establish preventative, joined-up statutory responses and avoid a costly ‘cycle of crisis response’. People with NRPF are routinely refused assistance when they present at statutory services. We often support women who are forced to sleep rough by these refusals, escalating risk and increasing the cost of providing crisis support. By extending NRPF, implementing barriers to regularising immigration or refugee status and prohibiting local authorities from providing Section 17 support to undocumented destitute children, statutory services will not be able to adequately respond to the risk of homelessness, inevitably increasing the cost of later intervention.
- Support low-income families to increase earnings:
The strategy acknowledges that it’s harder to meet rising housing costs without stable employment or childcare, but offers no measures to help migrant families in this position. Migrants are disproportionately in low-income work, forced to pay repeated visa costs and excluded from benefits-funded childcare. Extending settlement routes and adding an income requirement to Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR) eligibility will trap migrant women in a vicious cycle – they cannot access childcare, so cannot increase their earnings, and therefore never qualify for settlement, locking them in long-term housing insecurity.
- End homelessness for people leaving public institutions:
The Strategy acknowledges the high vulnerability to homelessness for people exiting the asylum system, who make up the ‘second biggest group’ of people rough sleeping after leaving public institutions. But in contrast to all other institutions explored (e.g. prison, care homes, hospitals), there are no measures to reduce this number. This is a glaring omission. Policies that could reduce homelessness for people leaving the asylum system, such as extending the ‘move-on’ period, ending camp/barrack use and improving access to legal advice are ignored. At the same time, reforms including temporary refugee status, a 20-year settlement route and a ‘refugee tax’ will significantly increase the risk of homelessness for newly recognised refugees.
- Tackle re-exploitation of modern slavery victims by preventing homelessness:
Many people owed a homelessness duty are victims of exploitation. The strategy highlights their high risk of re-exploitation, but commits only to improving identification of potential victims through updated guidance. Increasing identification of victims will not prevent homelessness or re-exploitation if the systemic issues with the National Referral Mechanism (NRM) are not addressed. Potential and recognised victims must have access to housing, appropriate financial assistance, quality legal advice and a path to regularise immigration status. Without this, victims will remain vulnerable to homelessness. The government’s current plans to penalise late disclosure of modern slavery will also increase refusals of support, undermining the aim of preventing re-exploitation.
References:
- Andy Burnham’s first speech as Prime Minister: 20 July 2026 – https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/andy-burnhams-first-speech-as-prime-minister-20-july-2026
- “Final chance to change”: the Makerfield count speech: 16 July 2026 – https://theburnhamprogramme.co.uk/makerfield-count-speech
- Andy Burnham’s speech to Labour Party Conference: 29 September 2026 – https://labour.org.uk/updates/stories/andy-burnhams-speech-to-labour-party-conference-2026/