Eight years and counting

Programme Lead Emily Cole blogs about the partnership entering its eighth year of delivery and takes a look to the future.

The Greater Manchester Housing First partnership has entered its eighth year of delivery – an incredible feat with the programme now one of the longest running in the country.

So much has happened since we began the partnership in 2019. From those early days as we began to develop fundamental policies and procedures that helped us grow to now as we enter a new phase of the programme and its ongoing development.

Over the years, we have added partners and learned so much to ensure we tailor the programme so it meets the needs of the people we support as well as remaining a hi-fidelity service.

It may be a distant memory now but we navigated the Covid pandemic and were able to help some of the most vulnerable people in society during a once-in-a-lifetime situation.

And through it all, we have stuck to our principles and strode forward in our quest to prove the Housing First model both works and should be central to any future government’s homelessness strategy going forward.

We recently rehoused our 450th person – a figure which seemed a pipe dream when we started out all those years ago.

And with funding guaranteed until 2029, we are entering a new phase of the partnership continually developing as we learn from experience and 8 years of successful delivery to ensure we can drive the service forward and continue to instigate systemic change.

The impact on the people and families we have helped over the last seven years is beyond measure – as is the gratitude to the part each and every person has played in helping the partnership become what it is today.

The faces in partnership have changed, but the undying commitment to excellence has remained and I’d like to pay a heartfelt thank you to every person who has played a part in this journey.

There is still much to do as we go forward but it’s worth a moment of reflection on the road travelled thus far.

And it’s worth remembering our motto as it’s as true now as the day we started – together, we are making a difference.