We are proud to share our Impact Report for 2023/24. The year was a huge one for St Martin-in-the-Fields Charity, wherein we provided grants to thousands of individuals and ten organisations, alongside supporting frontline workers across the UK and funding new and innovative solutions to homelessness. All of this is part of our commitment to tackling the crisis of homelessness, and we couldn’t have done it without the support of our generous donors.
It was also a year in which we were joined by our current CEO, Duncan Shrubsole, and began funding three new organisations through our mental health fund. We are grateful for the opportunity to continue to grow, and proud to share the impact of our work with you.
Before we get started
Before we get started
If you’d like to learn more about the various ways we help people at risk of or experiencing homelessness, then join our newsletter for the latest updates.
Individual grants
Individual grants
We provide small emergency grants to provide immediate assistance to those at risk of losing their homes, or those who need to move into new homes that are safe and suitable for their current needs. By addressing financial barriers directly, we prevent homelessness before it starts or resolve it quickly when it does happen. This allows people to maintain or regain their independence and stability.
In 2023/24, we:
- Awarded 4,508 grants, totalling £1,780,676
- Supported 7,512 beneficiaries through these grants, preventing them from experiencing homelessness
“Knowing he had a stable home of his own was very important, as the insecurity and instability of temporary accommodation was causing him a lot of anxiety.” Frontline worker and emergency grant applicant, Gloucestershire
Funding to organisations
Funding to organisations
We provide funding to 10 organisations or projects across the UK. By funding unique, essential projects, we are able to tackle homelessness across the four nations, allowing organisations with specific and/or local expertise to tackle the issues they’re seeing – such as mental ill-health, a lack of options of trans young people facing homelessness, and refugee homelessness, among others. We are also able to learn from the work that these vital projects and organisations are doing.
In 2023/24, we’ve continued to fund six projects through our Frontline Fund, within charities working regionally, across the four nations of the UK, to provide specialist support to people experiencing homelessness. These projects are:
- Project Z, by Caring in Bristol, that works with young people in Bristol
- Team around the Tenancy, by TGP Cymru, that works with young people in North Wales
- akt’s Trans Pathway in Manchester, that supports trans young people
- Extern’s counselling service in Northern Ireland
- Pathway’s legal advice service in collaboration with Praxis, giving specific immigration advice to migrants and refugees in hospitals
- LSA’s support to people leaving prisons, in Scotland
We have also continued to support The Connection at St Martin’s, a day centre in Westminster for people who are rough sleeping. Rough sleeping across the UK is at an all-time high, with Westminster having the highest number of people sleeping rough compared to other local authorities in the UK. Data from CHAIN for 2023/4, registered 2,102 people sleeping rough in Westminster, which is 18% of all those registered across London.
And, we began funding three specialist mental health focused projects across the UK. The findings of our annual Frontline Worker Surveys highlighted the need for focused mental health support for people experiencing homelessness and was reflected in our discussions with other organisations in the sector. So, we established the Mental Health Fund to provide multi-year grants to three organisations to develop innovative specialist and targeted support around mental health and homelessness outside healthcare settings. We are funding:
- Rowan Alba, in Edinburgh
- MAC-UK/Look Ahead, in London and the Southeast
- Platfform, in Wales
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Funding learning-led solutions
Funding learning-led solutions
The results from our annual Frontline Worker Survey highlight the changing needs of those experiencing homelessness. in 2023/24, we supported the testing of three projects designed to meet these needs.
- Homelessness Practice Incubator, which aims to work alongside organisations to learn from and test new and innovative solutions to homelessness
- Frontline Worker Wellbeing Pilot, a trial designed to support the wellbeing of frontline workers in the homelessness sector who frequently experience things like low wellbeing, burnout and fatigue.
- Personal Futures, a project developed to understand the impact and potential effectiveness of a personal, direct cash transfer for participants who are at risk of homelessness.
Working with frontline workers
Working with frontline workers
We continue to support and champion frontline workers, their roles and value. We know that key to helping someone out of homelessness or to prevent it in the first place, is having a skilled, experienced, empathetic and effective frontline worker. Too often, however, frontline workers are undervalued and lacking support. We support them through:
- Our Frontline Network, consisting of nine local networks across the UK, which bring together frontline workers to share resources, knowledge and form community.
- Training, through both our Training Fund and outsourced training programme, both of which allow frontline workers to attend valuable training for free, supporting their professional development, skills, and quality of support they offer to those who need it.
Influencing
Influencing
We are committed to amplifying the voices of frontline workers. One of the ways we do this is through our annual Frontline Worker Survey. We shared the report and key findings with organisations across the sector. We also used key findings to inform the general public about the challenges faced by staff working to help people away from homelessness and some of the innovative ways they are providing the required support.
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