RSI Co-Production Consultation and Development Project

The RSI funding round has supported a bid to develop the co-production of services with current and former Rough Sleepers, for those based in the City of London as well as those now housed outside of the area.

The City's objective is to ensure that the voice of those with lived experience contribute to the review of existing service provision and help shape our future commissioning strategies. A particular focus will be women and a better understanding of the common causes of women becoming homeless.

The funding will see an initial consultation phase in 2022/23, building on the work of the City Voices research report on the impact of the Everyone In campaign during the Covid pandemic.

This initial stage will provide the framework which will support the City's Rough Sleeping and Pathways team to develop a 3- year Co-production plan, which will be incorporated into the Rough Sleeping Strategy 2023-27.

The outcomes of the co-production plan, once approved, will be the basis of a two -year commissioned service to bring to life the commitments agreed in the strategy. The current expectation is that this is likely to be a peer advocacy team who will ensure rough sleepers:

- can better navigate key services - have their voices heard in professional and partner forums, - can work with staff to develop new commissioned services with their needs at the forefront of service delivery.

However, to ensure the approach adheres to the principles of co-production, ensuring ownership and support by the homeless community, the final picture of the service may differ from initial expectations.

Rather than being seen as a risk, this represents a genuine opportunity to innovate service delivery in an agile and flexible way. Current research on collaborative approaches suggests the approach improves the chances of successful service delivery, which lessens the risk of service failure.

The final commissioned service will be working closely with current City homelessness teams and services, supporting a systems approach to working with homelessness.