The All‑Party Group on Homelessness met at Stormont on 24 March to hear from four key organisations working at the frontline of homelessness: the Welcome Organisation, Extern, the Salvation Army and NIACRO.

In a wide‑ranging session, speakers outlined the growing complexity of need, the strain on staff and services, and the urgent requirement for sustainable funding and appropriate accommodation to support people experiencing homelessness. Here are three key takeaways from the session.

Key Takeaway 1: Challenges in securing accommodation for homelessness services

Three of the four organisations presenting outlined that they are facing difficulties in identifying suitable accommodation for their services. This can relate to difficulties with finding affordable property in the City Centre as well as stigma against people being supported by their services. While each organisation faced unique and different challenges, they all noted that this is a significant problem for their work.

All three organisations emphasised the negative impact these accommodation challenges have for their services both in terms of the people they are working so hard to support as well as for staff. This issue is impacting on several organisations across the homelessness sector who are working both in accommodation based and floating support services.

Key Takeaway 2: Recruitment and retention difficulties continue to deepen

All organisations described severe challenges retaining and recruiting staff. One organisation referred reported needing nine recruitment rounds for a single post, pointing to an escalating burnout trend driven by rising complexity and short‑term funding cycles. Another service noted that they have not had a full staff team since the pandemic and are increasingly reliant on agency workers to maintain service levels.

A number of participants warned that the wider sector is losing experienced workers because organisations cannot offer competitive pay or secure, long‑term employment in contrast to other parts of the wider economy — a direct consequence of unstable funding.

Key Takeaway 3: Sustainable, multi‑year, cross‑departmental funding is essential

Speakers and MLAs agreed that short, reactive funding cycles are severely undermining planning, recruitment, and service sustainability. Quarterly funding arrangements were described as “damaging” and a major barrier to prevention‑focused work.

The need for coordinated, multi‑year, cross‑departmental investment — particularly across health, justice and housing — was raised repeatedly. MLAs stressed that siloed departmental working continues to impede progress, especially around mental health, addiction support and early intervention.

We are grateful to our speakers for taking part. The next meeting of the APG on Homelessness will be in June.