Recommendations
Recommendations based on the Rights First project:
The three main policies attached to those projects are: social protection, housing and employment.
Fully integrated in the European Pillar of Social Right, these policies are provisions of fundamental human rights. In practice they demonstrate interdepency in rehabilitating people with full access to their rights, housing and employment: one is always conditioned by another, two depend on possessing an official address and all provide limited access to homeless people, particularly migrants
The target public is deprived of ressources, highly vulnerable and socially excluded but nevertheless still in age of working. Chances to reintegrate them on the labour market are slim if policies are not customized to homelessness vulnerabilities.
The minimum income
The minimum income is provided on the conditions of being granted the right to stay in the country and having an official address. During the project, EU mobile citizens sometimes faced the dilemma of risking the loss of their right of residency when requesting a minimum income. Indeed, European legislation allows member states to declare someone an unreasonable burden when economically unactive. In Belgium, the Migration Office assesses a person's unreasonable economic burden.
The recommendations are:
- Partnerships between homelessness service providers and public social welfare centres are important in facilitating access to minimum income and other social allowances. Given homeless people are subject to health and mental health struggles, time is of essence to avoid their situation worsening. By working closely together, they shall be able to improve administrative procedures to help homeless people more effectively. As a result, non take up of rights should be reduced and accessing enabling goods and services improved.
- To provide wider flexibility timewise for homeless people seeking job opportunities. Belgium has got into the habit of terminating the right of residence of people who have worked for less than 12 months before applying for unemployment and who have not been active in the following six months. Yet the average period of inactivity for a jobseeker, even a national jobseeker, is 6 months (Caldarini, 2016, p.10). As a result, people who are homeless or poorly housed find themselves deprived of their rights and freedoms because they are unable to meet Belgian administrative requirements.
Housing
Temporary or transit housing are adequate solutions allowing registration for an official address which, once acquired, could be a big step for the target group to progressively process their social inclusion.
The recommendations are:
- Systematizing the process of obtaining an official address in temporary housing
- The public social welfare centre is in charge of homeless people for as long as their situation has not changed, even if temporarily settled in an accommodation outside its borders.
- Given the saturation of the housing market, measures facilitating access to the private housing market should be undertaken. Affordable rent, anti-discrimination, enhanced support to safeguarding housing, housing renovation, eviction prevention are non-exhaustive but most needed measures to deploy.
Employment
Getting a job is a positive argument to get the residential right and become eligible for social protection. Another way to actively support employment is by partnering with private employers in view of raising awareness on the ability of homeless people to still work and securing new job offers. Coaching is provided to new recruits to encourage them in their new endeavour.
The recommendations are:
- The development of an inclusive labour market policy engaging private employers in hiring vulnerable people provided psycho and social support is delivered to sustain their job.
- To further invest in employment prospections (job hunting, training on digital tools, infrastructure combined with coaching).
- Intensify opportunities to lift people out of the street by providing temporary housing and an employment contract at the same time.
EU Mobile Citizens
The European Union's DNA promotes a single market stimulated by the free movement of workers beyond the borders of the Member States. It claims to be social and advocates equal treatment for national and European citizens. Yet social exclusion, poverty, long-term unemployment and inactivity are among the concerns of the European institutions, because many people in Europe are at risk of falling into poverty. The main question is: how to reconcile freedom of movement for migrant workers with guaranteed access to social rights in the host country?
The recommendations are:
- Fight against Roma discrimination and support home countries
- Automatic access and portability of social rights
- Stronger actions against mental health struggles related to a combined homelessness and migration background.
All information disclosed reflects the opinion of the author only. The European Commission is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information.
