Our Best Practice Team provides support, advice and assistance to organisations in Scotland providing services to homeless people.
Housing advice
If you are looking for housing advice we offer this as part of our services at Crisis Skylight Edinburgh. There is also advice with links to other organisations that may be able to help you in How to get help
Support for housing professionals
We produce materials to support local authorities, housing associations, private landlords and Help to Rent projects to set up and develop housing options.
We recently published a national overview of Rapid Rehousing Transition Plans (RRTPs), looking at how Scottish authorities responded to challenges set in RRTP toolkit guidance in key areas, such as widening housing access, reducing temporary accommodation and stepping up prevention. The review brings together emerging themes, patterns and tensions in relation to implementation, with practice examples, current or planned, which we feel are worth sharing.
We have promoted and collated best practice in the use of the Private Rented Sector (PRS) as a housing option in Scotland since 2005. Through our work across Great Britain, we have seen how the PRS can be a suitable and sustainable option for some people who are homeless. And recent changes to legislation make private renting in Scotland a more secure and reliable option than it is elsewhere.
We know there is an increasing focus on the PRS as one of the housing options local authorities must include in rapid rehousing plans. We completed a national survey of all local authority and third sector PRS access services and housing options team in autumn 2018 to get a sense of how PRS access works in each area of Scotland and what the challenges are. Following our national PRS and rapid rehousing conference in November 2018, we produced a best practice report with tips and ideas from PRS access schemes around Great Britain using different models.
We have also provided specific support to organisations developing shared housing projects, social lettings agencies and Registered Social Landlords (RSLs) drafting a Scottish RSL Charter on Homelessness.
We have developed a number of practical toolkits and advice materials which you can download from our Housing Resource Centre. Many of these are Scotland specific.
We also provide support and draw on experiences from our own direct services, including those offered by Crisis Skylight Edinburgh. As of 2019, this includes our new PRS access service Help to Rent Edinburgh, commissioned by City of Edinburgh Council (CEC) and developed using good practice derived from our wide network of PRS access schemes across Great Britain.
If you would like to find out how we can support you directly around any of the subject areas mentioned above or if you don’t find the information you’re looking for in the Housing Resource Centre, please contact: lucie.dunn@crisis.org.uk