We’ve stepped up our policy, campaigns, and research work at Emmaus UK to increase understanding about what we do and to encourage others to take action on homelessness.
Working closely with Emmaus communities across the country, as well as other charities and organisations, we want to influence change at the national and local level to end homelessness.
Hundreds of thousands of people are without a place to call home today. That’s why there has never been a more important time to fight for the change that is desperately needed.
Supported Housing Act
The Supported Housing (Regulatory Oversight) Act was passed by the government in August 2023, with the aim of introducing national standards and a licensing regime for all supported exempt accommodation.
This legislation covers the model Emmaus uses to house people with experience of homelessness.
We are leading a large-scale project to help shape how the Act is implemented — working closely with Emmaus communities, other supported housing providers, and people with lived experience.
To gather insight, we launched a survey and held focus groups with Emmaus companions about their experiences of supported housing. We also formed a Supported Housing Act Advisory Group made up of frontline staff and people with lived experience, to steer the direction of the project.
As part of this work, we’ve trained several companions as peer researchers to visit Emmaus communities and other supported housing providers. They are conducting interviews, running workshops, and helping us build a strong body of evidence on what good supported housing looks like in practice.
“I got involved with the project so that in the future, people won’t have to deal with rogue landlords who put profit above people’s health and wellbeing.”
David, Emmaus Companion Researcher
These insights, combined with findings from our discussions with other small supported housing providers, gave us a robust foundation to respond to the first government consultation on the Act (which closed in May 2025). In early 2026, we will publish our own report based on our research, and respond to the second government consultation.
Our findings will also inform local supported housing strategies and help influence best practice across the wider sector.
We plan to publish blogs, a podcast and other content to share our research and recommendations.
Read more about our Supported Housing Act project here.
National campaigns
We are joining forces with other charities to campaign around some of the biggest issues impacting on homelessness today. These include:
Action on Homelessness Manifesto
In 2024, we released our Action on Homelessness Manifesto, calling for urgent, coordinated action to end homelessness across the UK.
Our six key demands are simple but essential:
- Action on supported housing
- Create more affordable homes
- Take a cross-government approach
- Invest in long-term solutions to homelessness
- On the ground consultation with people with lived experience and local organisations
- No-one criminalised for being homeless
We’re now working hard to turn these calls into real change in this new Parliament. This includes working closely with the cross-government task force on ending homelessness and sitting on the steering group of the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Ending Homelessness.
Since the General Election, we’ve discussed our manifesto with more than half of the MPs who have an Emmaus community in their constituency. We also welcomed APPG Co-Chair Paula Barker MP to give a keynote speech at our National Assembly in October 2024.
We were pleased to see progress on several of our key asks — particularly around funding for new social housing — in the most recent Government Spending Review. You can read our full response here.
Campaigning against criminalising homelessness
We campaigned against the previous government’s Criminal Justice Bill, which would have given police the power to fine or arrest people sleeping rough for being a so-called ‘nuisance’.
In April 2024, we joined Crisis and 35 other organisations in writing to the Home Secretary to call for a complete rethink of the Bill.
After the General Election was called, we were pleased to see that the Bill did not progress. We then turned our attention to the Vagrancy Act — an outdated law that had continued to criminalise people simply for being homeless.
We were proud to help secure a major campaign victory when the government confirmed it would finally scrap the Vagrancy Act, ending more than 200 years of criminalising homelessness.
Campaigning to scrap no-fault evictions
Following reports that over 80,000 people were put at risk of homelessness since the previous government pledged to scrap Section 21 evictions, we have continued to campaign for an end to no-fault evictions once and for all.
We were pleased to see this commitment included in the King’s Speech after the July 2024 General Election, as part of the new Renters’ Rights Bill.
Research
Emmaus has conducted research in recent years to show the positive impact that our communities have, both for individuals, and society at large. Research in recent years has included projects such as:
Get involved
If you’d like to know more about our research, policy and campaigns work, or would like to get involved, we would be delighted to hear from you.
For policy and campaigns, please get in touch with Sam Dalton, Emmaus UK’s Policy, Campaigns and External Affairs Manager, via [email protected].
If you’d like to discuss our research projects in greater depth, then please reach out to Emmaus UK’s Impact and Evaluation Manager, Martin Burrows, via [email protected].